What If I Can’t Feel My Emotions?
Being able to build emotional awareness may take some time if you are used to ignoring, minimizing, or avoiding your feelings. Many people who have experienced trauma may feel “numb” to their emotions. After a traumatic event, our brains some times turn off our ability to feel emotions to protect us from the pain the trauma caused. This response is called dissociation. Whether you feel that you are purposely ignoring your feelings or if it is a response happening in your body, emotions play an important role in our lives.
Reasons emotions are important:
Emotions tell us what we values and helps us make decisions
Life would be pretty bland without emotions
Connects us to others through empathy
For survival purposes (ex: without fear we would die fairly quickly)
Helps us make sense of the world
Signs you are ignoring your emotions:
Telling yourself “I am weak if I express my feelings”
Believing you are too sensitive
Having a hard time identifying what feeling you are having
Not knowing what your feelings feel like in your body
Not wanting to acknowledge any difficult emotions
Three ways to start feeling again:
Bring your awareness to your body
Imagine there is a scanner starting your feet and moving slowly up to your head. Do you notice any tension in your body? Pay attention to what’s happening in your body without judgement. How your body is feeling isn’t good or bad, it just is. Take note of what’s coming up and let it be.
Label the feeling that is coming up
Examples: “I am noticing there is tension in my shoulders. I am feeling stressed.” or “I am noticing a pit in my stomach. I am feeling fear.” or “I am noticing my heart beating fast. I am feeling anxious.” If you have difficulty labeling the emotion coming up, check out the emotion wheel. There are many emotions that you might not event be aware of. When just getting in touch with your feelings, this step might be difficult.
Journal about your experience
Is there any judgement or resistance to being in your body with your feelings? Many times when we start being aware of their emotions, we feel uncomfortable. We may even want to go back to ignoring the feelings because it can be overwhelming. There might be this holy shit realization of what emotions actually feel like. Building awareness, acceptance, and acknowledgment may take time. However, the more you practice these steps the more you will be able to live fully in your life. Feeling your feelings will help you be able to listen to your intuition, be more connected with others, and become comfortable with yourself again.