Nourish Your Emotional Wellbeing when life is stressful
How do you nourish emotional well-being when life is stressful?
Your relationship with emotions determines your ability to Be Well Now. How each of us responds when strong emotions surface is complex. It is in part determined by messages you have received about how to respond to emotions. Those messages created mindsets and that created habits.
Is your habit to fight, flee, or freeze when strong feelings surface?
Is it to listen, support, and learn when strong feelings surface?
Likely it is both. For many people, the fight/flee/freeze habit is what they are used to witnessing. It makes sense why this is more common. Emotions change your body, so they can feel uncomfortable. Even the "positive" ones like joy can be uncomfortable, as I outlined in this article.
The way to nourish emotional well-being is to use those strong sensations to remember to stay present, curious, and kind. This keeps you aware of what emotional response you are feeding. With that awareness, you can choose to nourish your emotional well-being habit of listening, supporting, and learning from the messages of emotions.
Listening requires a trusting relationship between your brain, body, and heart. Your brain needs to know that when your body tenses, it's time to pause. If you ignore those signals, they won't go away, they will just accumulate. Your heart needs to know you will support yourself, responding to what it's saying about what you need right now. Your body needs to know you will move to clear the tension from those emotions so it can put energy back into healing and creatively dealing with the challenge.
The more aware you are the more your brain body and heart learn to work together again to nourish your emotional wellbeing. Fortunately, we are in a time of year when there are plenty of opportunities to practice!
When you feel strong emotions rising, pause, and listen to your body and heart. Support your emotional well-being with mindful kind movements to clear the tension from your body so your brain can learn from your body and heart about what you need to Be Well Now.
Before moving on, pause and check-in. What works for you to nourish your emotional well-being? Keep your toolbox handy and move on to Celebrate December Well.
If you are looking for more tips on nourishing emotional well-being when strong emotions like grief and anger arise, check out the latest episode of The Be Well Now Method Podcast with Dr. Jan Anderson, PhD, psychologist and expert on parent/child estrangement.
Share this with someone you know who wants to celebrate December in the Well State.
Why wait until January? Be Well Now!
Exercising Well is so much more than an exercise program. It's a pathway to rewiring mindsets so you know how to Be Well Now. This is a short-term program that gives you lifelong skills for moving well, nourishing well, and resting well. Move on with confidence in your self-motivation skills. even when you are limited by pain, medical issues, stress, or lack of time.
