Goal
Today, I want to discuss how to connect with yourself emotionally and why it’s essential that we do so.
What is an emotional connection?
Emotional connection is the state of understanding your feelings and emotion. Through emotional awareness, we’re able to understand and identify if we’re happy or sad or angry. With emotional awareness, we develop a deeper understanding of what we feel so we can respond in healthier, more positive ways to our legitimate feelings.
Why is emotional connection important?
During childhood, we are taught to deny our emotions.
When we do not have power over our emotions, we lose control of ourselves. By being attached to our reactions, we remain in control of our actions, and we are not victims of mood swings.
However, we want to do more than be in control of our emotions. We want to give our feelings legitimacy which will enable our hearts to guide us. For example, anger is not wrong; however, if we allow that passion to push us to hurt others then we’ve failed to exert control over and stay attached to our feelings.
How to connect with yourself emotionally
Emotionally connecting with yourself requires consistent and constant practice. However, the emotional connection starts with merely asking, “How am I feeling right now?”
We are programmed from a very young age not to acknowledge how we feel. The devaluing of our spirits as children is for the benefit of our adult caregivers; however, as we grow older we remain stuck in the frame of denying how we feel.
No matter what’s happening, ask yourself silently how you feel. This opens up the possibility for discussion, and you can start asking “Why do I feel this way?” “Is it a good thing?” With constant practice, it becomes easy to connect with ourselves with minimal effort.
Lastly, we can utilize this technique when talking with others, especially friends and family who may be showing extreme passions without realizing it.
Self-knowledge and emotional connection will serve you going forward and ensure that you have a deeper understanding of yourself.
When we connect with our emotions, we can help others do the same.
Actionables
Read the following:
- How do you rank your emotional connectedness? Are you good at identifying your emotions on the day to day or relatively terrible at it?
- Have you ever had a moment in your life that threw your emotional control for a loop? What was that moment and how did you respond?
- Which emotion do you wish you had better control over? Anger? Sadness? Why that emotional in particular?
- When feeling emotional, try asking yourself “What do I feel?” followed by “Why do I feel this way?” Does this help?
Please remember that it’s important to do the actionables. You’re not on this earth to simply read but to do. To become an individual, you must act more than you consume.
*Image credit to Unsplash
