What are the 6 Core Emotions and why are they important?

Please check out my video's on my Youtube channel or like my Facebook Page for parenting support and information XX 

What do CORE emotions mean?

Many of us have a bad relationship with certain emotions and will often experience them as negative or difficult. The truth is though, we all have them and each one of them is beneficial to us. Different theorists may argue on the exact labels and number of core emotions we humans have. What is seldom contested however, is the fact that there are certain emotions that ALL humans experience and have been experiencing throughout the ages and within all social, cultural and ethnic groups. I agree with the identification of there being 6 core emotions: Sadness, Joy, Anger, Disgust, Fear and Shame. Each of these emotions branch out into other associated emotions or feelings. We have many different ways of identifying with each emotion and the causes for each emotional reaction will differ between individuals and societies depending on beliefs and varying cultures. I know this all sounds a bit confusing. The bottom line is really quite straightforward, we are not so different underneath it all. We all FEEL. Our reactions are based on our emotions. Our thoughts and behaviours are very linked to our emotions. Behaviour is always a product of our thoughts and emotions.

As we grow up, our thoughts influence our emotions. We don't start out that way though. Our thinking or cognitions only start to develop after the first couple of years in childhood. Before we are able to think, we are driven by our emotions and sensory experiences of the world. This is why children are so genuine, innocent and straightforward. They are completely in touch with how they feel and react accordingly. Babies and toddlers all need similar things, regardless of their race, gender or environment. In fact, underneath it all, when it comes to emotions, adults also have similar needs. The problems lie within what experiences people have had in their childhood when attempting to get their emotional needs met.

Emotional Regulation:

This can be viewed as managing emotions. This is an extremely important part of parenting as it involves teaching children to identify and understand their own emotions. As mentioned above, children do not have the brain development to think about what they are feeling. They are unable to give it a name such as 'afraid' or 'angry'. They feel it in their body and react to these feelings instinctively. The role of the parent or primary caregiver is to help them understand what they are feeling and show them how to manage or cope with whatever they are experiencing. This is the same for all of the emotions, you are never expected to change how someone feels, especially not children.

It can be very difficult to accept that your child feels angry or sad or afraid. It can also be tempting to correct the child when YOU feel there are no justified reasons for the emotion. Emotional regulation is about validation. Teaching the child that it is ok to feel the way they feel and you will accept and love them through it. This displays unconditional love and teaches the child that they can trust themselves and how they feel. This will build up their self-esteem and confidence in the world. It will also enable them to value and love themselves. Having a healthy relationship with emotions will be the best gift you can give your children.

Every emotion is important and should be regulated and appreciated!

Anger:

Anger is a powerful emotion and is often felt when there is a sense of injustice towards yourself or someone else. Anger allows us to learn what our boundaries are and helps to keep us in check with how we expect to be treated. Anger helps us to defend ourselves and will alert us to our needs regarding fairness and respect. We often feel anger in our bodies in the form of tension and increased heart-rate. It is always good to pay attention to how you experience anger so that you may identify it early on, before it becomes overwhelming or harmful.

Some associated emotions and feelings for anger include:

Irritability

Frustration

Rage

Hatred

Tension 

Upset

Exasperated

Annoyed

Fear:

Fear is an incredibly important emotion as this alerts us to danger or threats to our safety. Safety does not always have to be physical, it can be emotional/mental too. We feel fear when we perceive something that has the potential to cause us harm. We feel fear in many different physical ways such as increased heart-rate, sweating, shaking, temperature fluctuations, tension, feeling sick or fluttery in our stomachs, tight chest or throat etc. People react to fear in many different ways.

Some associated emotions and feelings for fear include:

Worry

Stress

Insecurity

Instability

Nervousness

Jealousy

Cautious

Tentative

Anxious

Sadness:

Sadness is often a way of coping with loss of some kind. Loss can come in many forms and does not only involve a person or pet. When you lose something of value to you, this can bring about sadness. Sadness helps us to process this loss and grieve the change and pain this has caused so that it may be integrated into our world view or sense of selves. Sadness often involves withdrawal and internalising when experienced. Sadness can be felt in the body in many different ways such as a sense of feeling heavy, fatigued, tearful and emotional. 

Some associated emotions and feelings for sadness include:

Pain

Grief

Fragility

Upset

Lonely

Longing

Depressed

Anguish

Sorrow  

Disgust:

Disgust is an interesting emotion and lets us know what we don't like or can't bare to be around. Disgust can also occur when there is a sense of violation.  This emotion develops after the first 2 years. We often experience it in the forms of smells, certain tastes, textures and sights. Disgust repels us away from things that will often make us sick. We feel disgust predominantly in our gut in the form of sickness. People also pull a 'scrunched up' face that is very distinguishable for this emotion. Interestingly people who are blind also pull the same face despite never having seen it being pulled before (a natural reaction...). Some people literally are sick and may vomit if the disgust is intense. 

Some associated emotions and feelings for disgust include:

Repelled

Revolted

Violated

Repulsed

Nauseated

Horrified

'Grossed out'

Shame:

Shame is often confused with guilt. Shame occurs when a person feels there is something fundamentally wrong with them and who they are. Unlike the other emotions, shame does not have a positive purpose and itis important to teach your children the difference between 'doing' something wrong (guilt) and 'being' wrong (shame). Guilt can be beneficial as it alerts you to an action or reaction that has harmed or damaged someone or something. To feel shame is the opposite of self love and is the route of low self-esteem. Shame is created in childhood and is of caused by a lack of emotional regulation. Shame is often at the heart of mental illnesses. People often create many defences against this emotion on an unconscious level. The number one way it is experienced is when people hide who they really are for fear of 'exposure'. This can take many forms. Some people withdraw and hide, others lash out and become seemingly egocentric or angry. All people experience a great deal of internal strife with this emotion but it is not easy to recognise physically. 

Some associated emotions and feelings for shame include:

Humiliation

Embarrassment

Shyness

Guilt

Self-hatred

Loneliness

Emptiness

Powerlessness

Lacking

Joy:

Most people will understand this emotion to be 'happiness'. This is considered the most positive emotion and this is because it feels good. Happiness can come in many forms but it is identified by it's lack of internal strife and misery. This emotion denotes a sense of peace and calm, even if there is energy and excitement. The peace described is internal. Happiness is felt in the body in the form of energy, smiles, head held high, glowing/sparkling eyes, bouncing or having relaxed muscles. We feel the happiest when we are being our true selves and doing what we feel is right for us fundamentally. We can also find joy and happiness in relation to other people's joy. The catch: to feel happy is to have a healthy relationship with all the emotions so that you are not in resistance to them. Resistance to emotions prevents inner peace.

Some associated emotions and feelings for joy include:

Happiness

Excitement

Glee

Calmness

Peaceful

Tranquil

Euphoric

Blissful

Content

Uplifted

In a nutshell:

Many of us will have been under regulated in certain areas in terms of getting our own emotional needs met in childhood. This is not intended to create blame. This was not known in our parent's day and it is not common knowledge now. I am hoping to be a part of the solution to that and to inform you all about how important our emotions are and how vital it is to teach children how to manage them. Resistance to emotions is what causes the most suffering, not the emotions themselves. Somewhere along the way we have been taught that certain emotions are negative and that feeling pain or fear is wrong. So many motivational quotes will tell you not to feel your fear or anger. They will tell you to focus on the positive and ignore the past. The truth is, the past doesn't go anywhere and neither do these needs. We just develop ways of coping which often cause us more harm in the long run.

I will attach a video from my Youtube channel which gives you a great activity to teach emotions to your kids. Please feel free to ask questions or comment below. You can also email me personally at tacklethefeelings@gmail.com.

I hope this has been helpful!
XX
Paula

Anxiety! My experiences with healing my own Childhood Emotional Neglect.

Please check out my video's on my Youtube channel or like my Facebook Page for parenting support and information XX 

Anxiety is very common and nothing to be ashamed of!

Most people will experience a level of anxiety at some point. Most of us know this to be 'stress'. Whether you have an anxiety disorder or whether life has gotten the better of you and you are struggling with the feelings of stress and anxiety, it can be very hard to deal with.

I could come at this from a more clinical perspective and tell you that Anxiety is a fear based disorder classified as 'excessive worry' by the DSM-V (Diagnostic and statistical Manual used to categorize and label mental health illnesses). Instead I would like to talk about this in a more real, experiential way, sharing my experiences and how I have worked through and with my own anxiety. As with all illnesses, there are some common symptoms but every person is unique and will have their own experiences. I am no different. Hopefully this will help you to view anxiety a bit differently and approach your own stress in a slightly different frame of mind.

My Journey with Anxiety:

I have experienced 'stress' for as long as I can remember. I feel my anxiety in my body more than anything. Anxiety is a very physical disorder for many people due to the inability to relax and the high levels of worry that you may experience. Your body starts to react which I found increased my worry and made me feel trapped in this state of hypersensitivity. When I am anxious I tend to feel a great deal of pressure. The feelings of anxiety will latch on to relevant issues in my life that deserve a bit of stress but my reactions far outweigh the problem. Much of the time I manage this without people being aware. One of the worst mental pitfalls of anxiety that I experience is rumination. Thoughts that go round and round. Playing conversations in my head over and over. Having imaginary fights with people, even strangers, often based on me lashing out in defence to perceived threats or insults. None of this is warranted, none of it worthy of the amount of energy I expend. I end up mentally exhausted and angry. I become frustrated and angry with myself and often feel ashamed at my inability to control this. The negative, judgemental self talk starts. I feel defeated and want to escape, run away and start again. The light at the end of the anxiety attack seems very distant and at times I can't imagine it being there.

For me, mental exercises such as stopping thoughts and re-framing thoughts is difficult. Cognitive Behavioural Therapy works well for some people but for me, it added to my mental exhaustion and didn't fit. I never went to a CBT therapist, I did a group when in the UK and found the whole process to be a great learning opportunity (budding psychotherapist that I am) but in no way helpful or applicable. In fact one of the members was clearly grieving and had been lumped in this group without being fully assessed. The mental health system can be like this at times. We are so hell bent on finding a quick fix, evidence based solution that the government will fund that individual experiences and the acknowledgement of people having complex life experiences falls by the wayside.

The impact of Childhood Emotional Neglect:

Anxiety is often a product of emotional neglect in childhood. I have learnt a great deal in my own healing journey and would very much like to share this with you all. Emotional neglect is a bit different from emotional abuse, which we associate with emotionally manipulating people in order to control them or put them down. Childhood emotional neglect is a bit different and possibly one of the most damaging forms of abuse. It is often not deliberate at all and I hesitated calling it abuse. It occurs when parents or carers fail to effectively meet their child's emotional needs. Children are not attended to emotionally and they are not taught how to manage their emotions. Often this is because parents have not had their own emotional needs met. It is generational. Fear stems from instability and a lack of safety in the world. When needs are consistently not met in childhood this creates anxiety from an early age. Anxiety is a tough one to identify though as stress is such a common state. I remember being in a pharmacy looking for a vitamins and chose one that was good for stress. The pharmacist asked me if I was stressed and I replied 'Who isn't?' She said to me that she wasn't and looked taken aback by my response. I started to wonder if my stress was unusual.

The Key to my healing lay in my emotions:

I learn't in therapy and through my own personal growth and professional knowledge that instead of trying to change my thinking patterns, I needed to understand my emotions. I needed to understand what my child self went through on a feeling level. I had become so cut off from my felt sense, from how I experience things in my body. I was unable to connect to many of my feelings, I stayed in the realm of thinking and intellectualising. I inherently had to learn how to do this again. Meditation was key for me. I struggled a great deal at first. I find doing this whilst being open to exploring your true feelings and experiences in a safe and guided manner is the most helpful. I needed to work on some deep set beliefs I had been holding for most of my life. I have had a lot of shame and am still muddling through this aspect of myself.

People don't just develop Anxiety for no reason:

The release for me has been confronting my anxiety and the reasons for it head on. I do not believe some people 'just develop it'. This is a myth and centred around our denial and resistance to looking at how we have been parented. This is not a criticism at all. I know first hand how guilty you can feel seeing the people who gave you so much as being the people who hurt you emotionally. Let me tell you though, once I worked through my attachment issues with my mother, I realised one day that my memories of her had changed for the better. The very memories that induced so much pain have been re-framed in my mind and I was seeing them more fondly. I understood her, I saw her for who she was and loved her more deeply than I was ever able to. In working on my childhood pain with a therapist that I trusted I was able to release the intense emotions attached to my trauma. I learnt how to be the parent to myself and identify my own needs and meet them for myself. This process is tough and so much comes to the surface before it can be released. This means the intensity heightens and you have to be aware of the process or you may just want to retreat back into your shell (believe me, that's normal). Should you persist, you WILL overcome it and come out so much stronger. Each challenge becomes that little bit easier. You find strength to work on yourself in ways which you never thought possible. You look at patterns in your life that no longer serve you. You start feeling a sense of self love you never thought was possible. This takes time but something I always felt was that although there is pain, it's NEW pain. It sure beats the same old ruminations and stress.

Learning how to trust my true feelings:

Not all therapist's believe in this. Working on your childhood attachment trauma when suffering from anxiety or any mental illness is the key. It allows you to release and purge this unwanted baggage and change in a way that you can't possibly go backwards from. You learn HOW to work on yourself and WHY you are feeling the way you do. You learn how to feel and trust your feelings. You learn about who you are. I no longer struggle in the same way. I get triggered at times but I allow those triggers to surface and I observe them, my behaviour and work through my emotions. Like I said, you learn how to work on yourself, on your shadow self.

Don't lose hope!

Anxiety is not a life sentence and you don't need to stop your thoughts or change anything. On the contrary you need to observe them, accept them and reflect on them. Let them guide you. Focus on your feelings, really work hard at being in the present and with whatever you are experiencing. Be kind to yourself and hang in there!

Take care,
Paula X

A easier way to understand 'Childhood Development', 'Emotional Regulation' and 'Attachment' in Parenting

Please check out my video's on my Youtube channel or like my Facebook Page for parenting support and information XX

No child is born 'evil' or 'bad'. Despite many people out their believing otherwise, the very tough home truth is that children are a product of learning or circumstance. This is something I believe with my whole heart and if no other message goes through, let it be this one! If you were told something awful like that as a child...it is not true. Simple. What isn't simple, however, is understanding why children develop behavioural problems, or behave in ways that are associated with our idea's of 'bad'. I thought the best way to go about this would be to explain some of those fancy phrases or terms such as 'attachment', 'emotional regulation' and 'development' in a way that is easy to comprehend and apply to your own lives.

DEVELOPMENT

I will start with development as most people know about this to some degree - if for no other reason but because we have all progressed through early development ourselves and continue to develop throughout our lives. When development is mentioned in relation to children, it is about how a child is growing, learning and reaching milestones specific to a rough age group. Theorists such as Freud and Erikson (the 2 that spring to mind the most for me) and many others have attempted to create comprehensive 'stages of development'. I wont go into what their theories are in this forum but I will discuss this concept of developmental stages a bit as it can become a great source of stress for parents, particularly if your child is said to be 'delayed' or 'immature' for their age.

There are many theories but none of them are absolute and rigid. These milestones are meant to act as a guide. Children should start to teethe, walk, talk, make associations etc around certain ages. Some children advance in some areas and take longer to develop in others. This is normal. Your child is unique and special and should be assessed as an individual, the same as adults. Some areas require more effort and support than others on the part of parents and educators. Children are often put through assessments at school in their early years in order to assess for readiness to move up to the next grade or level. Ideally this is done in order to support the child, not to criticise and pass judgement. That said, many people do feel judged and finding out your child is behind can be quite confronting for parents. For the most part,delays in development are not an indicator of disability, slowness, lack of intelligence or underlying issues. Often it is about being flexible and understanding that your little nipper is constantly learning and their brains are still developing. Children are each exposed to different stimuli, experiences and learning opportunities and the rate at which this learning takes place is going to differ slightly for each child.

When to be concerned:

With everything, it is always good to consult with a professional if you notice areas of struggle or delay that are worrying or substantially different from other children their age. Keep talking to your Doctor and keep yourself informed about what milestones to expect from what ages so that you are able to align your expectations with your child's capability. When professionals assess a child for abuse, often these developmental stages act as a guide for abnormal behaviour. An example would be a child who is being abused may regress or halt development in certain areas like speech. Teachers should hopefully pay attention when children who are, for example, 3 years old and have not started forming words or sentences yet.

EMOTIONAL REGULATION

This is something that you may actually know about on a basic level. We need to teach children about emotions and appropriate ways of expressing them. This is something most parents do naturally. Emotions are learnt through modelling (children watching you and your emotions) as well as through validation, which is when you reinforce their emotional experiencing by acknowledging their feelings. If you try and hide emotions from children it can actually be more harmful than protective because young children are more in tune with their intuition and senses than with thoughts and reasoning. They will pick up on your emotions and react to them. Being appropriately transparent is a great way to teach your children about different emotions and take away the fear surrounding the more negative emotions such as anger and sadness, I want to stress that you do not need to be transparent about your problems and the reasons you are feeling a certain way, adult problems should not burden children. What you should do, however, is explain that you have an adult problem and it is making you feel sad or angry or frustrated. If you are crying, explain to the child that you are crying because you are feeling sad etc. It is a parents job to familiarise and support children through their emotional experiencing so that they can feel comfortable in their reactions and do not feel guilty or ashamed of 'how they feel'. I find it is easier to teach children about emotions like you would shapes, colours, the alphabet and other common lessons. Associate emotions with colour and ask children to match different emotions to the colours they think represent the emotion. There are many lovely activities to help you with this but the best way is to lead by example.

What happens when a child's emotions are not regulated?

Due to the sheer enormity of child abuse and mental illness, this is an area that is strongly backed up by research although the negative effects of insufficient emotional regulation have been known to many frameworks of psychotherapy and psychology for years. Within child abuse literature and laws, neglect has been proven to be just as harmful, if not more harmful in some cases, than physical abuse. The reason is due to this regulation of emotions and attachment (which I will chat about shortly). Neglect is not simply about not playing with your children or not giving your children constant attention. It is about failure to help them develop and learn, failure to build up their strengths, failure to validate them as human beings and failure to normalise their experiences and teach them that feeling emotions is normal and not to be ashamed of. Safety is not only about a physical environment. Children need to feel like they can make mistakes and will still be loved and accepted. They need to be able to have trust in the people caring for them and they need to be able to ask questions and learn how to manage their feelings appropriately so as not to harm themselves or others in any way.
Going back to my initial statement of children not being born bad or evil, this is a prime example. Children do not have the mental capacity and ability to process their feelings and articulate their needs like adults can. That does not mean they do not feel the same emotions, it means they often are unable to understand them. Children who behave in challenging ways are often acting out their emotions due to a lack of a better outlet or guidance. They are attempting to get their needs met. Discipline and structure are important here, not in terms of punishment, but in terms of safety and boundaries. When you punish a child for expressing their emotions inappropriately, it is important to spend some time teaching the child more appropriate and healthy ways to react without shunning the emotion itself. ALL EMOTIONS ARE IMPORTANT and serve a purpose.
If a child has never been taught how to understand their emotions they will struggle in life to various degrees. The child may go on to develop low self-esteem, mental illness such as anxiety, depression and in extreme cases, more serious mental illnesses such as Borderline Personality Disorder. They will most likely struggle to have healthy relationships and may struggle to handle stress in life. As they have not been taught that certain feelings are normal in certain situations, they will have to work all of this out for themselves along the way. This will mean that they will struggle to feel confident in their reactions and may feel out of control and easily overwhelmed. A good example of a child not having their emotions regulated is when the primary caregiver has mental illness, lets say depression, and struggle to feel their own positive emotions such as joy and excitement and thus are unable to model these to their child. The child may race home with a gold star only to be met with a half hearted smile. The child may become confused and mistake this reaction for a mistake in their own feelings 'this gold star is not something to be excited about'. That lesson will be learnt and the child will be left with confusion. Later in life the child may go on to find that they are unable to recognise joy and excitement.

ATTACHMENT

This ties into both development and emotional regulation and stems from 'Bowlby's Theory of Attachment'. It is about the relationships and emotional bonds
that are formed  between people. Children will form an attachment to their primary care giver, usually the mother figure. This is different to other relationships of friendship and romantic attraction/love. It is a deep relationship requiring trust and a sense of belonging where the person creates a bond that is extremely influential to their sense of being in the world. The earliest attachments in childhood are the most important and impact behaviour, self-esteem and self reliance and have a lasting impact throughout the child's life. To have a secure attachment, your child will learn that you love them unconditionally and will be dependable and reliable. Again, many parents do this naturally by meeting the infant's needs, accepting the child's mistakes, spending quality time with the child, creating structure and safety and routine in the child's life, teaching the child continuously, being patient, showing and expressing love and guiding the child through challenges.

When the attachment is not secure: 

This can happen for a number of reasons, namely, it happens when a primary care-giver is not consistent or does not create this bond effectively with the child. Inherently, it happens when the child's needs do not get met (physical, emotional and other). If the child continuously receives mixed messages, they will become confused and will not feel secure. This happens when a parent is abusive and the child is never sure how the parent will react. It can also happen when a child is neglected or left to fend for themselves in some way. It also happens when the child's emotions are not regulated. Not having this security can lead to a range of issues down the track for example they may be unable to form healthy relationships, either becoming too dependent or too avoidant, unable to feel secure in a range of areas within their life. Thus this impacts self-esteem and confidence. Some people may go on to suffer from various forms of mental illness, similar to a lack of emotional regulation.

Some final words:

As a parent it is your job to teach your child how to believe in their own ability and experiencing. It is important to take care of yourself so that you may take care of your child. The best way to teach a child is to lead by example. I hope this has not created fear in new parents, it is not meant to frighten and scare, rather to inform. Love your children, treat children like children and don't expect children to deal with adult issues. Children learn best through play and through modelling so remember, live by example and do not use your children to meet your needs, it should be the other way around. There are no rule books and formula's, you will mess up more than once and that's ok. It is how you handle the mistakes that count in the end. Dr Phil always says 'it takes a hundred atta boy's to make up for one criticism. Never call your child names like stupid, useless, bad, hopeless etc, they will believe you and take this on board. Always punish the behaviour not the person. Your behaviour is naughty not you are naughty. Take time to explain why you are angry or upset with them, let's get rid of the 'because I said so' and replace it with a solid response 'mummy wants to keep you safe and so the answer is no'. Encourage questioning and exploration and encourage tolerance and love!

Those are my thoughts and I encourage you all to keep learning about this and find ways that work for you and your family.

XXX
Paula

How to cope with difficult emotions as adults

Please check out my video's on my Youtube channel or like my Facebook Page for parenting support and information XX

To teach your children you need to understand yourself:

I have been wanting to put something I have recently discovered down for you all around coping with difficult emotions. I say recently because until recently, I have been a bit of an 'avoider'. Not deliberately and not completely. I have always been in touch with emotions in general. I have never been uncomfortable around other people's emotions (with the exception of anger at times). Today though, I am talking about those deep buried emotions that we try our best to avoid or ignore. Those emotions we deny because of the fear and negativity we experience when we feel them. The ones we think will swallow us up whole, never returning us to the light.

All emotions, including happiness, have the potential to be difficult:

The reason for this is because of the experiences associated with the emotions and what these emotions mean to us. Fear is one of the big and uncomfortable ones. Fear is also something we enjoy in certain contexts such as watching a horror movie or going on a ghost tour. There is a huge market for spooky things for Halloween due to our love of getting thrills and chills. Why is this? Why can we invoke fear on one hand and build up massive defences against it on the other?

It is not the emotion we are fearing:

It is not the emotion that gets us so to speak. As children, we are driven by emotions and our 'felt sense' or how we perceive the world outside of thoughts and logic. We have the strongest instincts when we are children because we are unable to understand other people's feelings outside of our own experience of them. We don't talk ourselves out of feelings. We don't anticipate what loss, anger, sadness etc. will feel like. We live in the present and take each experience as it comes. We don't fear emotions. What we are afraid of is the lack of understanding, the unknown.

This fear of emotions comes from childhood and feelings we have experienced that have not been made clear to us. We have not understood our emotions within a difficult experience and have had to find ways of making sense of them without the tools of logic, learning and reason. Many of us build up defences in order to cope with these tough emotional experiences. When we feel something that unconsciously (or consciously) reminds us of this difficult experience, we logically assume it is the emotion that makes us feel this way. That the unbearable nature of what we are feeling must be due to our anger or fear or pain or sadness etc. We build up walls against these particular emotions and feelings and attempt to move out of them as quickly as possible in various ways. I hope I am making sense?

Let me give you an example:

My father was not a part of my life. Fundamentally I felt abandoned and rejected. I felt sadness and hurt that he 'didn't want me'. My mother did her best to compensate for this by believing in me and expressing how much I was wanted by her. She tried to explain to me all the reason why he couldn't be a father to me. As much as she tried to help me to see that it wasn't because of me as an individual that he wasn't around, I still felt abandoned by him. I still felt loss and sadness at the fact that my father was not around and didn't want to be. This sadness was not attended to, by my mother and then later on by me. The reason was due to it being misunderstood and it was not something she was aware of in terms of my emotional needs. Sadness and emotional pain has always been quite difficult for me on a fundamental level. The deep sadness. Even in my grief, I struggled with truly experiencing this on a full level. I shoved it down and moved on from it as quickly as possible. I built up a world of defence mechanisms to cope with feelings of sadness, rejection and abandonment. One of my biggest defences is anger (an associated emotion I developed). For years the feelings I have felt towards my father have been anger. Anger has been a much easier emotion to bare, it has protected me and given me a false sense of security and justice. I have also developed the habit of trying to 'fix' other people when they feel sad. I have always felt sadness and pain is something that needs to be fixed or something I need to help people to avoid. As a therapist I have had to work extremely hard at allowing people to be in these emotions without trying to move them out of it and give them solutions. People will heal from discovering their own solutions.

The truth is though, in order for you to feel relief, you need to fully experience your feelings!

The pain comes in when we bury them or build these defences up against them. We take these defences on board and keep using them way beyond their necessity. In my case, the anger has been holding me back in so many ways. My lack of ability to experience sadness fully has also held me back from being who I really am. It made the significant loss I have experienced incredibly hard and drawn out. It effects my relationships (all of them). It prevents me from being true to my own needs and living in a way that is in alignment with who I really am and would like to be.

To overcome difficult emotions, you need to allow them to come up to the surface:

Think of something at the bottom of your tea cup, it is much harder to reach inside the cup and dig it out than it is to scoop it out when floating on the surface. You may just burn your fingers trying. Your buried emotions are the same. You need to have patience and understanding as each emotion starts to float. It won't all come at once although it can often feel like it does. To reassure you, your higher self or unconscious is in tune with your needs far more than your conscious self. In the same way as our dreams, we will never be given more than we can bare. If you are experiencing a difficult emotion, know that you are strong enough to cope with it. It wont feel good. That is to be expected.

The minute you let go of your expectations around how you should be feeling, you will accept and work through how you really feel. If you can allow the emotion to come through and have your full presence, your organic, natural and instinctual self will integrate and work through it. Once you have worked through it, it will be released. It will not only be released but you will be much better for it. You will learn from it and grow from it. You will feel relief and you will no longer have to bare the weight of the heaviness that comes with holding it in. This can take some work, especially if you are like me and have a lot of resistance to your difficult emotions. Start with trying to identify how you feel in your body.Get to know how you experience emotions and be gentle with yourself. Find time to be by yourself to think, feel and behave in the ways you need to. I personally like to be by myself to grieve and cry. I play sad music, light a candle and look at photos. When I am angry I like to vent, play heavy rock music or to sing or write. I am starting to honour the complex nature of my emotions and feelings and I have taken control back. I make it a point to understand all of the emotions and appreciate the importance they have in my life. In all our lives. The key to happiness and relief is in you, in being true to who you are and what you honestly feel.

There is no such thing as a bad emotion! Only bad experiences associated with emotions.

Love and light XX
Paula

Shame on me, Shame on you

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Hi folks,

This was always going to be a tricky blog to write because of the vast impact the emotion SHAME has on pretty much all cultures and groups of people. And to be the bearer of bad news, the links to the negative impact of this emotion stem from childhood and how this emotion is misunderstood, under regulated or even inflicted by parents and/or guardians of the child. This topic can be triggering for people who have experienced trauma in the form of shame and I urge you to notice how you feel and pay attention to any resistances that emerge for you. Treat yourself with love and compassion when tackling shame.

What is Shame?

Let me start off by explaining shame a bit as it can often be confused with 'guilt'. Guilt is when you feel you have done something wrong. Shame is when you feel that your being or who you are is fundamentally wrong. Still confused?
Shame basically makes you feel inadequate or lacking in some way (or all ways) on a deep, personality/character, fundamental level. People who feel this way spend their lives attempting to hide this from the world. It becomes so ingrained that you begin to hide your shame from yourself unconsciously. Like me, many of you will be completely unaware of your shame but well aware of your insecurities and fears. So many of us have insecurities it actually becomes unusual not to have them. Some cultures, like mine, celebrate a level of humility and look down on over confidence and high self esteem. A certain level of shame is almost expected and considered normal in some Western cultures.
Have a think about yourself and your levels of self esteem, I have described a few,what I call 'shame bombs' below:
Perhaps you hate getting in a swimming costume in front of others or have issues with you body or the way you look. Perhaps you get intimidated really easily and feel your opinion will be laughed at or put down. Perhaps you struggle to trust your significant other or friends. Perhaps you have a fiery temper and are unable to control it and your reactions. Perhaps you have an addiction of some sort or battle with substance abuse (Some of you may be familiar with the term 'Dutch courage',which is fondly used to describe how alcohol frees your inhibitions and makes you brave). Perhaps you have a phobia or suffer from a mental illness (eg depression, anxiety, bi-polar, borderline personality disorder, narcissism etc). Perhaps you are either the perpetrator or victim of domestic violence. Think of the impact of low self - esteem, what kinds of feelings associate with this way of being.What does shame FEEL like?

I have discovered my own shame in my journey of self discovery. Perhaps to ease the blow of your own shame being identified, it may help you to hear about mine.

My Journey of self discovery:

I had no idea I was sitting on a bed of shame. What I knew is that I had something big inside that was unprocessed and frightened me. If you start to study psychology and counselling, you develop a theoretical knowledge about things like shame. You know that to work with shame therapeutically you work in a similar way to trauma, carefully and gently. Despite having a real interest in this emotion, I did not make the links to my own experiences and reactions. Those who have read my previous blog will know I lost my mother when I was 17. I always attributed my unexplored pain or what I called my 'vault' to unprocessed grief and some issues I had with my mother as a teenager that were not resolved when she was killed. I am a person who reflects and is not afraid to work on herself. I believe in this process and feel it is vital to understand my way of being and experiences in order to help other's understand theirs. I never ask anyone to go anywhere I wouldn't go myself.

The problem was, I had no idea what I was up against and despite numerous efforts to resolve my grief I was struggling with anxiety and feeling like I was losing myself more and more, the closer I moved into my profession. This was actually quite the opposite. I was starting to grow frustrated with how I was reacting to things. The more I worked with children and families, the more I started to burn out. It was my eventual burn out at the end of the year that pushed me into therapy with someone I chose specifically. My therapist is also my mentor and I absolutely love how he works and thinks. This is important.The relationship between you and your therapist is fundamental. Why you may ask, because this process requires trust and vulnerability. You need to work up to a level of trust to allow yourself to revisit your childhood or perhaps a better way of looking at this is 'inner child work'.

My mum was empathic, loving and warm. Not a day went by that she didn't tell me she loved me when she was alive. Anyone who knew her would be shocked to hear me speaking like this. I did not accept any of this easily either. Week after week I tried to resist this concept, this shame. In terms of attachment (relationship bond, critical to healthy childhood development) I am not secure. To be specific, I have an 'insecure preoccupied' attachment style from an 'anxious ambivalent attachment' [John Bowlby's attachment theory - for those wanting to know more]. What this means in non clinical terms is that my mum was inconsistent at times and I lacked boundaries. My mum struggled to say no and despite very early childhood discipline such as spanking and enforcing rules, I was often given far too much control and say in my upbringing as my childhood progressed. If my mum was unhappy about something, she placed the decision on my shoulders but made me feel guilty for 'wrong' decisions. I lacked guidance in the form of structure and routine. My mum lacked conviction and confidence in her rules. I ruled the roost. My attachment style means that my mum and I were very expressive and close but our emotions were far too entangled and volatile. I was always mature for my age, due to being given too much responsibility too early on, which encouraged the belief that I was able to hear things that were not always appropriate for my age. This was not limited to my mother, most adults forget my age and still do. The role of child and parent was often confused and not clearly defined. I have always been pretty good with my brain and learnt how to manipulate situations into my favour from very early on. We all create defence mechanisms and these are dependent on many things, namely our personality and family culture I believe.

My Shame started as a baby:

Unfortunately this did not all begin in childhood. It started earlier than that. And this is difficult to convey because I do not have clear memories. My shame started as a baby. Shame may occur when needs are neglected. I want to stress that none of this was intentional in my case although I am aware that this is not true for everyone. I have discovered that I wasn't consistently attended to. I had to piece bits of memories together like a puzzle. I wont go into detail but will share a few. I remember my mother saying things like she was lucky if I slept 20 minutes at a time. I remember her suggesting to a young mum to leave her baby to'cry it out' at night. I have seen a photo of my extreme distress when having a bath. I have temperature issues now which suggest I was not attended to in terms of being too hot or too cold. My mother believed that babies don't feel the cold like adults do. So as you can see, there are little things, often based on beliefs from that era, that show neglect but not intentionally. I also needed to take into account the fact that my mum was a single parent, we struggled financially, my mum had her own past trauma's and had health issues (osteoporosis). I have a suspicion she may have suffered from Post Natal Depression, but not much was known back then and support certainly wouldn't have been free in South Africa.

I want to highlight the most important part in this - inconsistency. As a little baby, without thoughts or brain development outside of instincts and drives, I was completely dependent on my single mother to keep me alive. If I needed something, I would have cried or cooed and attempted to get attention. As a baby, my instinct would have been one of extreme fear and anxiety if my needs were not met. This is because on an instinctual level I knew I would literally die if not attended to or left alone in the world. Thus if you leave a baby to cry and cry and ignore them, this creates fear and anxiety due to survival needs. This can be true for children in their formative years too (under 4 or 5 years old). When the child is hungry but does not get fed, or feeling pain but does not get comforted and looked after, or is cold but does not get given something to keep them warm etc, the child becomes insecure. The world does not feel like a safe place. They are not able to understand the complex reasons for why the parent is not attending to them. When a baby is unable to see or sense their parent or an adult, they do not have the brain development to understand that the parent still exists and will come back. They learn that they are not worthy of this attention or the attention is conditional if parents are continuously inconsistent in meeting needs and this creates 'shame'. Even babies will start adapting their behaviour to attempt to get their needs met, thus learning they have to be something else in order to receive love. They live with a fundamental fear and as the years go on this fear and belief that they are unworthy becomes completely embedded and internalised. They learn that being who they are and acting on how they feel is not acceptable.

Every individual is different:

Each individual person will react differently to this and develop their own ways of coping. These coping mechanisms are often valuable in childhood but become maladaptive later on. For instance I developed a temper. If I felt someone was attacking me in some way, I fought back. I developed structures and things in my life to 'prove myself' and I like control.In fact I need control and even as a child I was extremely bossy and battled to share. I don't take to authority well. I become overly familiar with people quickly and my close friends are like family to me, yet I always feel this is conditional. Underneath I often feel like I have to give something in order to receive. I question people who love me for me and for years accepted that people like me for certain parts of me but would not like me if I expressed what I really felt or what I really needed. I wasn't dishonest, I just showed people parts of myself depending on what I thought they would respect and like. I am lucky because I am extremely good at reading people and have made this way of life something almost innate- but not quite. This, I believe, is the reason people say that you can feel lonely even though you have so many people in your life that love you. This sentence is another shame bomb. You feel lonely because you are alone. No one is seeing you. No one is hearing you. No one truly knows or understands you. You don't even know or understand yourself.

Shame creates a feeling of emptiness:

People with shame often feel an emptiness inside that cannot seem to be filled. It's that feeling of lacking, of not belonging. This is shame. Many of us have learnt to repress certain emotions such as anger or sadness. A good example is gender stereotypes where men are discouraged from the more 'feminine' emotions such as sadness and fear. Thus my culture is full of men who suffer in silence and are unable to even talk to their friends about their pain. Shame is a powerful emotion and is bigger that most people know. We use every trick in the book to avoid feeling it and often these include destructive or harmful behaviours.

Why punishment creates shame:

Understanding what shame is and how it operates is extremely important for all people. Punishment is often our first port of call for pretty much most 'bad' behaviours. Punishment, without understanding and help for the person, exacerbates problems. Look at the prison system or issues with substance abuse for a good example of this. We need to be tackling shame and helping people find ways of healing this. Teaching people why they feel the way they do and helping them to find healthier ways to react. Bringing shame out to the surface releases it's power on you. Punishment creates more shame. This is why I am completely against spanking. This is one of the most shaming strategies a parent can use. If you have already done this, it is important to spend some time building on your child's self esteem and teaching them about emotions and how to better react to them. I know this is hard to hear, but spanking a child for a bad behaviour is like punishing them for your lack of ability to teach them the correct behaviour. I always find it ironic that parents will spank their child in order to teach them not to hit, or bite, or push etc. You are not modelling the correct behaviour when you do this, rather they can see that you hit, so the problem must not be the hitting,it must be them, they are the problem...shame bomb! Children are resilient, you can completely turn this around! Teach your children about emotions and give them appropriate ways to cope with how they are feeling.

There is always hope!

All is not lost for adults too. The trick is to re-parent, soothe and nurture yourself. For those who struggle, my best suggestion is to make use of a therapist that understands and works with attachment trauma (most experienced practitioners do). Always be kind to yourself and notice when you are being your own abuser. Actively aim to stop this. Cut yourself some slack and start honestly asking yourself what you really need.

XX
Paula