Be.

Bismillah.

I get asked pretty often how I deal with my emotions. My answer use to be something along the lines of, “I don’t” or “I’m not really an emotional person”. But the fact of the matter is, there’s not a person on this planet that doesn’t FEEL. We all come in contact with the same emotions at some point in our lives. The difference is in how we deal with them or whether we even choose to deal with them. For a long time I chose not to deal with and where’d I wind up? Crying on a therapist’s couch, being told I need to “feel shit!”. Of course with me being me it didn’t click right away. It took some time for me to really get a good understanding of what she meant by that. She was basically telling me that, I need to take the time to identify what I’m feeling and be present in it. Not just see it and ignore it. So, the first “assignment” she gave me was to spot signs of grief. I got home that day, which was surprisingly enough not too long after my birthday. And as I spoke about in previous posts, the month leading up to and after Christmas are always rough! And this year(speaking on 2019) was no different, it was actually the worst I’ve experienced. It felt like nothing could go right and I was clinging to the wrong things. Just like she assigned me to do, I began to carefully watch how I felt when certain thoughts and memories would come to mind. Like thinking about happy memories as opposed to thinking of someone being absent.

I noticed that whenever I’d think about dancing with my mom in her living room, or my grandmom randomly stopping me in passing to remind me of how handsome I was. I’d smile and be able to go on about my day unhinged. But in reverse when I’d think of certain milestones they’d “missed”, I’d get angry and then frustrated. That frustration would eventually give way to sadness which would cause me to shut down. Of course she yelled at me for that too, but that’s another story lol. So, a few weeks went by until our next session and she asked if I’d done my homework. My response, “I think I did but I don’t know. I had some thoughts about my grandmom and mom, that made me mad and sad at once.” As I continued to explain what I was feeling she stopped me and asked “do you see what you just did?”. Once again Lionel being Lionel I replied “nope! All I know is, I wanted to cry but I must not have drank enough water today because no tears formed.” After she finished laughing at me she said “you allowed yourself to actually feel something, instead of just passing it off to the next day.” This took me totally by surprise because I thought I’d been doing this. But she got me to see that being present is the best thing you can do for yourself. Especially in times where you feel you’re drowning in emotions.

So, over the last 2-3 months I’ve gotten into the practice of keeping myself in the moment. Not allowing myself to think too far ahead or too far behind me. Something I’ve gotten into the habit of saying is “I can’t speak on the future nor can correct the past because I don’t live there!”. In my opinion being grounded in your emotions allows you to think clearer and avoid a majority of the pitfalls you might’ve experienced had you not been. Plus, you can either control your emotions or someone else definitely will! And I can attest to that! Me not controlling my emotions landed me on that damn couch that day! But life is totally different at this point and that was only a few short months ago. It just goes to show what can be accomplished when actual discipline is applied! I sat myself in my hotel room everyday after class and digested that day’s thoughts and feelings. So much to the point where I could almost map my day out in accordance to how I felt when I woke up! Who to avoid that day, where not to go because I knew it’d make an already rough day rougher. I can honestly say having this much control over MY emotions has brought the exact peace I needed!

On the flip side of that peace is….the constant claim of being “emotionless”. The fact is I’m not emotionless, I just won’t allow someone else’s emotional imbalance to dictate how I feel. Just because you feel a way doesn’t mean I have to as well. I can be compassionate towards your situation without having to feel exactly how you do. Stop pushing so much for people to “feel you” and learn to feel yourself!

Aslaamu Alaykum.