What if emotional pain isn’t something to escape or avoid?  Pain is always information. Changing your perception of pain can lead to massive transformation.

Society, education and conditioning often teach to avoid and repress emotional pain trying to control your outside circumstances: trying to change how you feel with accumulation of material things, trying to change people so you can get attention, love from them and so they make you happy, or thinking that a change in your external world will operate magic on how you feel inside. This way, you could heal the symptoms but not the cause of your pain.

Here is the trap of illusion because even if you manage to control your outside world to feel better, it will work only for a period, and the emotional pain you were running from will finally show up stronger and harder. Emotional pain is not less important than physical pain! When you break your leg or your arm, you feel physical pain that lets you know that a part of your body requires attention and care so it can be healed back to wholeness and healthiness. You cannot walk with a broken leg. It’s absolutely the same with emotional pain! Why don’t we give the same level of attention and importance to emotional healing? It is a serious fact that emotional pain can prevent you to function, hold you back and eclipse your potential to live a fulfilling life. Learning to see emotional pain as the glorious signal that your soul needs healing so you can feel better, is fundamental.

What causes emotional pain and how to recognize it?

 Sometimes you go through life experiences that can have much impact and consequences on an emotional level. A heartbreak, the loss of a beloved one, unfulfillment in your personal and/or professional life, a setback, a traumatic life experience, life circumstances, and a past memory can cause you so much pain, emotional distress and trauma. An unresolved wound can also create false and limiting beliefs manifesting themselves in your reality through unworkable patterns and repeated unworkable painful situations. However, when you are not aware of the importance of this signal, the possibility, that you would tend to neglect it, or try to repress it, is great.

Emotional pain can make you feel despair, powerless, hopeless, and uncomfortable. Emotional pain has much power to distort your thoughts, your reality, how you feel about yourself and life, and it can cause depression. To cope with the pain felt inside, some people will try to find relief developing unhealthy habits.

Trying to find relief from emotional pain

 When the pain becomes unbearable, some people will try to escape it seeking relief outside of themselves. They can develop behaviors that can become addictive. Addiction is a response to an unhealed trauma. Unfortunately, they are so many behaviors and addictions that can be developed to cope with a painful reality. To name a few: alcoholism, work alcoholism, use of drugs, eating disorders, escapism, sex addiction, love addiction etc. Emotional pain can also lead you to create “defensive mechanisms” – overthinking, seeking safety and certainty trying to control your external circumstances, holding on fantasy, self-delusion, overcommitting, sacrificing yourself etc.- to cope with what causes you pain inside. Those addictions and behaviors could be attempts to escape from pain, but they do not heal what is causing the pain. The thing is that emotional pain can express itself insidiously. It happens that the pain has been repressed for so long that you are not aware of it. The first step of emotional healing is to become aware of your pain; the pain has always to come up, so it can come out. Now, your question is probably how can I become aware of my pain if I have repressed it? Your life experiences and your repeats make your pain come up to the surface so you can confront it and heal it. That’s why some of your experiences leave you heartbroken, in pain with a feeling of being devastated. Emotional healing is necessary and valuable to take back your power.

How can you do emotional healing?

There is not a miracle formula, there is only healing work to do. Healing work is a process for change. You must reconnect with your emotions even when they are negative. Emotions always carry a message. Listening to them will help you to reconnect with your inner being and its guidance.

They are so many modalities you can use to do healing work. The purpose of emotional healing is to break free from your pain, regain your spark and power. Emotional healing will help you transform your emotional trauma into strength. You can start to explore your feelings and deepen your self-awareness with books and articles on specific topics. You can also ask for help and support to a therapist, a psychologist, or/and a coach focused on your issue during your healing process. You can use modalities like art therapy, spiritual healing, counselling, hypnotherapy etc. Find and try the modalities you feel called to try, and that work for you. Never hesitate to ask for help because healing can be overwhelming. Do healing work with the person(s) that create a safe space for you. Invest in yourself, in your healing because it is the best investment you can do for your life and personal growth. Ultimately, be very patient and gentle with yourself, you are doing your best. Healing is not easy, but it will always empower you and allow you to become stronger and relaunch higher.

With love, Sarah Anouar

You can share this article, leave your comments below and let me know what modality did you use for your healing?