What Are Your Emotions Telling You?

My life is my teacher and being a mother to a 13 year old girl currently is like getting my Masters Degree.

Recently I entered her room to bring her breakfast and found her sitting on her bed crying because her boyfriend broke up with her via text the night before.

*I sat with her in her sadness, frustration and crashing of emotional waves.

*I asked her how she is feeling in that moment.

*I asked her what she needed in that moment. It was a hug from me <3

*I asked if she wanted to tell me what happened, which she did. She actually handed me her phone to read the entire conversation. I did and I asked her what she took away from it. I didn't immediately explain all the things i saw and how i'd handle this. I asked her what she saw and what she thinks is the best way to handle it.

I let her think about it all.

I let her feel it all.

I didn't try to take it away or turn her pain into anger.

I sat with her in HER feelings without trying to make it more comfortable for me.

My daughter told me she wasn't sure what she was thinking or feeling but she knew she wanted to go to the beach for the night (or two) with the family to just reground and process what she was thinking and feeling.

I found an airbnb and we packed up and left.

So what is MY lesson in all this and how does it pertain to my adult woman life?

Yesterday the US saw the drafted and leaked document about the overturn of Roe VS Wade. I have my own feelings about this but the biggest one and easiest to name is anger.

I feel anger that people are STILL trying to control women.

I feel anger that women have to fight for bodily autonomy.

I feel anger that there is such a divide between feminine and masculine energy.

I feel anger that women are being seen as "evil baby killers" which sounds like an accusation from the good ol witch trail days.

I feel anger that woman aren't being better protected and supported.

I feel anger that people are fighting for the lives of babies BUT NOT doing ANYTHING to help women after they have a child. They are doing nothing to protect and support that new mother. They are doing nothing to educated people earlier and younger about sex. There are so many things that can be done BEFORE we start the oppression of the woman body but no one is picketing that.

But what does this have to do with my daughters recent break up?

When she was going through all her feelings, I NEVER tried to down play, explain away or dismiss her feelings. I empowered her to feel them all and understand what they were. I told her how anger can be a response emotion from pain or fear and it's ok to sit with it to find out what the deeper feeling is. We talked about how pain and anger are fuel on our passions! Pain and fear are necessary in everyones life to help them see what is important and to give them a boost to act. Creativity can stem from pain or fear. So I asked her to sit with and ask herself what her feelings were telling her.

So now i have all the feelings and my anger is from generations of suppression of woman. It is a pain and a frustration that woman and men turn on woman sooooo easily. We turn on healers and call them witches. We turn on the beautiful and call them sluts or attention seekers. We turn on the secure and whole woman and call them whores. We turn on the independent and call them bad mothers or un lady like.

A lot of the women who are on the receiving end of judgements like these are angry and eventually lash out to only then be seen as "men hating, baby killing, angry, mental women" No matter what we do, we are seen as hysterical and unsafe. This literally stems back to the beginning of human history. How is this not something to be frustrated and angry about? We should all be angry about it!

Is everyone feelings the way I am? No. That tells me that my feelings, as big as they are, are here to shine a light on something unique within me. It shines a light on my fierce passion for woman empowerment! It shows me my unique ability to get big, research unbiasedly, be open to change and new perspectives and to look for a solution. Not everyone is like that. If opportunities to feel big emotions don't arise to allow us to feel big feelings, we wouldn't have direction to see what we are passionate about or maybe to see an only wound that needs some attention to heal.

We can use our anger, pain, joy, curiosity or any emotion as a compass to point us in the direction of what we are passionate about. We can live a bigger and more meaningful life built on growth and alignment with who we are if we stopped running, dismissing or numbing our feelings, "good or bad".

My daughter didn't want to be angry at her boyfriend. She didn't want to feel pain. I allowed her a loving, supportive and safe space to explore both of those and she came out so whole and healed. We need to allow people to feel their feelings and i am passionate about teaching people how to do that and how to hold space for other peoples feelings, especially if they are different then ours. I am passionate about creating a safe and supportive space for people to feel scared, uncomfortable or uncertain. I myself need that safety and support from my husband so that I can explore all of me, good, bad, scary, crazy... you name it and im sitting it in within the safety of my home and my husband.

So how can we create a safe and supportive system so that ALL people and their unique feelings can be felt, processed, honored and healed authentically? Can we imagine a country where woman were allowed to be? Can we imagine a country where men of power or authority used that to create a safe and supportive space for us to be? And i mean really BE. Can you imagine how freeing that would feel for woman and the love, beauty and creativity that would flow freely from us because we are safe and supported! We wouldn't need to be angry and defensive all the time. We wouldn't need to feel like we have to get big or be hard or act more in the masculine just to be heard, seen or feel safe. We wouldn't feel like we have to defend ourselves all the freaking time if we were defended!

I pray for this future. I will mediate and send love into the world with this vision of balance, love and support. This will be our "Heaven On Earth". I feel deeply that the first place to start is by allowing our emotions to speak and direct us to what we need to heal and what we need to act on. All the planets healing starts within each one of us. We need to learn to honor our emotions and how to honor the emotions of others, especially if we don't understand them.