How difficult is it to stay with your feelings? 
We live in a world that promotes escaping our feelings. If we are depressed, doctors give us pills so we don’t feel the deep sadness. When we have physical pain we also get pills to take away the physical pain. I understand why being with feelings is so difficult. In the midst of the trigger where feelings come up of anxiety, anger or deep sadness our first reaction is to do something to not feel it anymore.
Also who wants to feel physical pain, this is why we work so hard to alleviate it, this I understand. But when feelings come up it’s critical to sit with them and explore them and not medicate them. So many times the minute we feel anything, our reaction is either to fix the situation creating the feelings, or to shut down or even to the blast the person that triggered us. It’s so important to realize that these are our feelings that have nothing to do with them.
When we stay with our feelings we are able to examine them and shift the old limiting belief that is creating them. This way we do our work instead of projecting our feelings outside of us. This is an inside job.
If we just stuff our feelings we will end up storing them in our minds and in our bodies and this is when we will hold anxiety that will create other health issues. This is why it is so important that no matter how big our feelings are, the best thing we could do for ourself is to be with them.
Unfortunately we live in a culture that doesn’t support emotional awareness this is why we tend to push away our feelings. However I believe things are shifting. The more we look at mind, body, and spirit, the more we become aware of the importance of our feelings. There are so many retreats, workshops, and books that help us deal with our emotions. My personal retreat is all about looking at what feelings you have and why they are there and handling them in a healthy way.
When we allow ourselves to feel fully when our feelings are present, we tend to move through them with greater ease. This isn’t so easy when you don’t have the tools to be present with them. This is by my personal retreat is so critical.