The Sedona Method: Your Key to Lasting Happiness, Success, Peace and Emotional Well-being. Hale Dwoskin

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СКАЧАТЬ A big part of how we suppress our emotions is by escaping them. We take our attention off them long enough so we can push them back down. You have probably heard the expression “Time heals all wounds.” It’s debatable. For most of us, what that really means is, “Give me enough time, and I can suppress anything.”

      Granted, there are some times when suppression can be a better choice than expression—for instance, when you are at work, and your boss or a coworker says something that you don’t agree with, but it is not the appropriate time to give them feedback. It is habitual suppression that is unhealthy and unproductive.

      We escape our emotions by watching television, going to movies, reading books, drinking, using prescription and non-prescription drugs, exercising, and a whole host of other activities designed to help us take our attention off our emotional pain long enough so we can push it back down. I’m sure you would agree that most of the items on this list are not inappropriate in and of themselves. It is just that we tend to pursue these activities or use these substances to excess, and we lose control. We use them as a compensation for our inability to deal with our inner emotional conflicts. Excessive escape is so prevalent in our culture that it has spawned many thriving industries.

      By the time we are labeled adults, we are so good at suppressing that most of the time it is totally second nature. We become as good or better at suppressing as we originally were at letting go. In fact, we have suppressed so much of our emotional energy that we are all a little like walking time bombs. Often, we don’t even know that we have suppressed our true emotional reactions until it is too late: our body shows signs of stress-related illnesses, our shoulders are stuck in our ears, our stomach is in knots, or we have exploded and said or done something that we now regret.

      Suppression is one side of the pendulum swing of what we are usually doing with our emotions. The other side of the pendulum swing is expression. If we are angry, we yell; if we are sad, we cry. We put our emotion into action. We have let off a little steam from the inner emotional pressure cooker, but we have not put out the fire. This often feels better than suppression, particularly if we have blocked our ability to express. We often feel better afterwards; nonetheless, expression also has its drawbacks.

      Good therapy is generally based on helping us get in touch with and express our emotions. And healthy, lasting relationships certainly could not survive without us clearly expressing how we feel. But what about when we express ourselves inappropriately outside of a therapeutic situation? What about the feelings of the person to whom we have just expressed? Inappropriate expression can often lead to greater disagreement and conflict and a mutual escalation of emotion that can get out of control.

      Neither suppression nor expression is a problem in and of itself. They are merely two different ends of the same spectrum of how we usually handle our emotions. A problem arises when we don’t feel in control over which one is happening, and many times we find ourselves doing the opposite of what we intended. Very often we get stuck on one side of the spectrum or the other. These are the moments when we need to find the freedom to let go.

      The Third Alternative: Releasing

      The balancing point and natural alternative to inappropriate suppression and expression is releasing, or letting go—what we call the Sedona Method. It is the equivalent of turning down the heat and safely beginning to empty the contents of your inner pressure cooker. Because every feeling that has been suppressed is trying to vent itself, releasing is merely a momentary stopping of the inner action of holding these feelings in so you can allow them to leave, which you will find they do easily under their own steam. As you use the Sedona Method, you will discover that you will be able to be free to both suppress and express when it is appropriate, and you will find that you will more often opt for the point of balance, the third choice of letting go. This is something you already know how to do.

      Though you have probably become an expert at suppression and/or expression, even so, you are still letting go. True laughter, for instance, is one of the ways that you let go spontaneously, and the benefits of laughter in the area of health and stress elimination are well documented. Think of the last time you had a really good belly laugh. You may have been watching a funny program on TV or having a conversation with a friend and, all of a sudden, something struck you as funny. You felt a tickle inside, heard a guffaw come up from deep in your middle, and your whole body started to bounce up and down. As you laughed, you probably felt lighter and lighter inside and progressively happier and more relaxed, almost warm and euphoric. This is also a good description of what you may experience at times as you use the process described in this book. Although most of the time you won’t laugh out loud as you let go, you will often smile and feel the same sense of inner relief that comes from true laughter.

      Have you ever lost you keys or your glasses and turned the whole house upside down only to find them in your pocket? Think back to the last time that happened. You probably felt more and more tense as you turned over the contents of your house, maybe even emptying garbage cans if you were desperate enough. You kept going over and over in your mind where you could possibly have put the keys. And then, almost as an afterthought, you reached into your pocket and let out a sigh of relief—Aahhh—as your tension and anxiety melted away when you discovered you already had the keys, or the glasses, all along. After calling yourself a couple of names, your mind probably got quiet, your shoulders relaxed, and you may have felt a wave of relief pass through your body. This is another example of how you release right now.

      As you perfect your use of the Method, you will find yourself able to go right to this point of realization and relaxation, even on longstanding issues that you were tearing your life apart trying to resolve. You will discover that the answers have been right inside you all along.

      “At work, I am more energetic, proactive, and positive. I am in sales, and rejection does not have the same effect on me. In fact, I am now finding I get much less rejection.”

      —David Fordham, London, England

      Sometimes a spontaneous release takes place in the middle of an argument. Picture a time that you were in a heated discussion with someone that you care about when the following happened: You were really into it, absolutely sure you were right and justified in your position, when all of a sudden you caught the other person’s eyes and, without trying looked deeply into their being, you connected with them at the level that makes them as special to you as they are. In that instant, something relaxed inside and your position no longer felt as justified. You may even have glimpsed the conflict from their point of view. Perhaps you paused for a moment and reconsidered the situation, and then found an easy, mutually beneficial solution.

      As you master the ideas in this book, you will learn how to see more than just your own point of view, which will free you from all sorts of conflicts, some that you may even have forgotten you have.

      The Continuum of Letting Go

      If you review your life, you will probably recall many instances that you have let go. We generally let go either by accident or when our backs are against the wall, and we have no other choice. As you focus on reawakening and strengthening this natural ability within yourself by practicing the Sedona Method, you will be able to bring releasing under your conscious control and to make it a viable option throughout your everyday life—even when you have days like the one described earlier.

      The chart below will give you a better understanding of the process of releasing, whether it’s the spontaneous releasing you already do or the conscious releasing you will be doing as you explore this book. It will also help you to better distinguish between letting go, suppressing, and expressing. Each category represents a continuum that everyone is moving through in all moments.

      

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