“I feel very powerful sensations in my chest, and the feelings are always hurt, anger, grief, hopelessness.”
Joan writes:
I recently started doing Focusing again to cope with heartbreak after a very painful divorce, combined with the betrayal of a friend. When I did Focusing in the past, I had a variety of sensations in different places in my body. Now, each time I engage in this process, I feel very powerful sensations in my chest, and the feelings are always hurt, anger, grief, hopelessness. It is working for me, but I keep having to come back to the same feelings, in the same location in my body. Do you have any tips on how to work with one overwhelmingly large life issue that keeps showing up in the same place? The sensations vary slightly, but the emotions are mostly the same.
Dear Joan:
I am so sorry for those very painful things that happened to you. And glad you are doing Focusing again. You even say it is working for you, and that is excellent.
And yes, I do have few tips that might help.
You are speaking about your feelings with words like “hurt,” “anger,” “grief,” “hopelessness.” That makes me wonder if you are connecting with the one in you who is having those feelings.
Let’s take hopelessness for example. When you simply feel “hopelessness” in your body, that may not go anywhere. It’s hard for those feelings to change because they are being labelled.
Instead, say, “I am sensing something in me feeling hopeless.” Now you are inviting a connection with something in you that is feeling hopeless right now.
Say Hello to that one in you, and sense what kind of contact it (she) would like from you right now. Now something new can happen, because you have shown up as a compassionate listener, giving company to the hurt one inside.
What happened to you was really really hard. It makes sense that there would be strong feelings in reaction, and that they last as long as they need to.
And as you show up in your inner world as Self-in-Presence, you are building the resources of strength and resilience you need in order to both be a gentle healer inside and take forward steps again in your life.
