"Ideas enveloped in feeling are creative actions. Use your divine right wisely. Through your ability to think and feel, you have dominion over all creation." - Neville Goddard
Feelings and their close cousins emotions are two sides of the same coin and together they play a fundamental role in forming our realities. Without the energy they provide nothing would ever be created, they are the fuel for our fires.
"Emotions have immense power. This power can propel you towards your dreams and goals, or sabotage and ruin your life. Choose wisely how to use the power of your emotions. " - Stan Jacobs
Everything that is revealed to us 'out there' is in harmony with the ideas we hold. As the sages would tell us, "As within so without."
The world that unfolds before us is a world that is consistent with our dominant beliefs and strongest expectations: what we hate or dislike as well as those things we admire. To change the world we experience requires us to change the matrix of our beliefs; the inner world they inhabit.
"Your unconscious responds to notions about who I am' with ideas and opportunities to move in that direction, so define yourself with care, lest your fears are realized instead of your desires. " - SETH
Some would have it that we are slaves to our emotions. That each of us is in the hold of some unconscious, uncontrollable power that has the ability to overwhelm us at any given time. And like riding a bucking bronco we must cling on as best we can. When in reality through our 'free will' we have complete control over our destinies and all our creations. It is entirely our choice if we decide to recognise and embrace this power or not.
"We cannot choose our external circumstances, but we can always choose how we respond to them." ~ Epictetus, (55-135 C.E.)
What are feelings?
Though closely related and interlinked feelings and emotions are not the same and recognising the difference between them is crucial in understanding how they work.
"We see that every external motion, act, gesture, whether voluntary or mechanical, organic or mental, is produced and preceded by internal feeling or emotion, will or volition, and thought or mind." - Helena Blavatsky
Feelings depend entirely on you for their existence and the level of influence they hold. Contrary to popular opinion external events, including other people cannot make you feel anything!
"We enter into every situation with certain beliefs or expectations. Those beliefs and expectations directly influence the way we are going to end up feeling about the event or person. " - Dr. Edelstein
"In other words, our beliefs and expectations about a person or event or situation directly influence and, many would argue, cause our feelings. They are not the result of or inherent in of the situation itself. Others do not cause our feelings - we cause them ourselves.". John
M. Grohol, Psy.D.
Each of us perceives the world through the unique prism of our own unique experiences. Our beliefs, attitudes, and expectations dictate how we feel and what we feel in any given situation.
The question we must ask ourselves is whether we prefer to base these choices and responses on truth rather that centuries of misinformation and lies.
Rather than running on automatic pilot, allowing our subconscious minds to take control, we can consciously choose the feelings and emotions we generate through the thoughts we think.
"How we choose to live our lives has tremendous power over the way we feel every day. If you are aware of your thoughts and emotions, you can choose to change them!" Prof Nicholas Christakis M.D, Ph.D, M.P.H & Prof James Fowler Ph.D
You choose what you think- what you think makes you feel.. and what you feel dictates your expectations, reactions, and responses to the events in your life.
"An example of a long-lived thought is an attitude, which develops as thoughts are repeated over and over and reinforced." - Karen Lawson, MD
"Feelings are emotional reactions to beliefs." - The Seth Material, Jane Roberts
If you live in a part of the world where the naked body is believed to be 'dirty' then if you were to bare your breasts in public you would feel shame.In other parts of the world in the same situation you would feel no shame. What you believe to be true fundamentally influences how you feel in a given situation. If you believe that what you are doing /thinking is shameful then you will feel shame.
If you believe what you are doing is dangerous then you will feel fear.
If you believe what you are doing is good you will feel happy.
If you believe you live in a safe universe then indeed you do.
"You need not say, "The universe is safe, " for, at your present levels that will only enrage you! You say instead, "I live in a safe universe, " and so you shall. " - The Seth Material, Jane Roberts
What is an emotion?
From Karen Lawson, MD, Director of Integrative Health Coaching for the Center of Spirituality and Healing:
It may be useful to think of emotions as the flow and experience of feelings, for example, joy, sadness, anger, or fear. Emotions can be triggered by something external (from seeing a friend suffer or watching a movie) or something internal (an upsetting memory).
Emotions are transitory, underlying and unconscious. The underlying ocean to our feelings the waves. And we all have very similar emotions no matter where we're from or what culture we belong too.
Emotions can be activated/triggered by external events; sadness or fear when watching a movie, anger if cut up by another motorist, joy if your sports team wins etc.
Or internally by what we choose to think:
"This area is dangerous" = fear.
"This is a sin" = shame.
" I'll never see her again" = sadness.
Here are a few examples of feelings and their cousins emotions that might help in distinguishing the two:
Feelings are low-key but sustainable.
Happiness is a feeling.
Worry is a feeling.
Contentment is a feeling.
Helplessness is a feeling.
Emotions are intense but temporary.
Joy is an emotion.
Fear is an emotion.
Enthusiasm is an emotion.
Sadness is an emotion.
Source - www.laughteronlineuniversity.com
"Emotions play out in the theatre of the body. Feelings play out in the theatre of the mind." Antonio Damasio
Simply put emotions are physical, short, intense and largely unconscious, deep-rooted responses to events both actual and imagined that occur in our lives. Our feelings are conscious mental deliberate constructs that we make up in our 'minds'. And crucially can be changed by those same minds.
Sink or Swim?
It helps me to think about my emotions as an ocean, a vast underlying ocean of raw and untamed energy with the endless waves that break the surface representing our feelings.
"Emotions can frequently hurt and cripple, until you begin to grasp that you are their source and thus their master." - Mike Dooley
Instead of living in fear of this awesome power that lies within us - drowning in this sea of emotion, we must learn to surf the waves of our feelings like a pro surfer ...and we do this (to keep the analogy going) on the surf-board of our thoughts.
Our aim here is not to suppress our emotions or negate them in any way- while here in the physical they are as much a part of us as our skin. And without the energy and power they provide our dreams would be forever dead in the water. Futile attempts to remove or block our emotions will only result in further problems. The suppressed feeling or emotion will manifest itself in some form no matter how hard we battle against it
Controlling what you think, believe and therefore feel is of course no easy task it takes dedication and focus and commitment.
"Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself." - Rumi
So how do we change our feelings?
Well the good news is that this an inside job. And you are already very good at creating. look around you, the good, the bad, the beauty and the ugliness, It was all created, is being created even as you read this, by YOU. It is a perfect representation of the thoughts and beliefs you hold.
"The greatest discovery of any generation is that a human can alter his life by altering his attitude. " - William James
The aim is to master this divine power we all possess and direct its immense and loving energy into areas we choose and prefer. As oppose to giving up the directorship of our lives to ego based responses and unconscious programs. Our goal should be to become loving conscious creators of reality than the fear based unconscious creators we currently are.
Science has proven that this is not a world of independent objects that we can influence but rather a sea of potential energy, that we are all connected at the quantum level and that mind is the matrix of all matter. In fact without us, our consciousness, there is no matter.
You are the lightening rod of the reality you perceive and if you desire change in your life then it is you who have to change.
You have to change what you think on a daily basis, your attitudes and expectations.You have to change who you are, what you believe and what you feel.
I feel blessed
