Wednesday, July 19, 2017

What is an Emotional Detox



Emotions are a funny thing. They’re irrational and don’t follow your set plans. It seems like emotions are a lot like words themselves. They refuse to be pinned down and when you try to explain them, to really use words to capture them, they slip through the cracks every time.
What I’ve come to realize is that emotions are multi-dimensional, that they don’t follow a set timeline nor do they follow the linear movement of the brain that separates yesterday from today and tomorrow.  I’ve come to see emotions as not a set words or phrases but rather as images and atmospheres that seem to whisper the internal excess of meaning that bulges out of words like happy, sad, insecure, angry, bitter.

The truth of the matter is that we never feel one thing at any given time. Sure, there are moments when happiness is amplified and you feel happy more than any other emotion, but that’s just because all the other more silent emotions are taking a back step, waiting for the right image, the right atmosphere to sing their tune once more.

I say all of this to come to the point that emotional detoxes are important. Being alone with oneself is a vital exercise in letting those overshadowed emotions come to the forefront to have their say. I think that if they don’t have their say, if they are not given a voice or some outlet of expression, then they will fester, become ingrown and lead to outbursts of irrational behavior.

What is an emotional detox? For me it seems to be a deep contemplation of the river of consciousness that exists in everyone. It’s allowing the mind to roam around within itself, connecting the past, present and future into one atmosphere, one image, if such a thing is possible.

A lot of the times we run away from our emotions, using various methods to distract us from our most insecure and painful memories. But what if we faced our demons? What if we took the time to really think about our feelings, to connect to them, to play music that creates an atmosphere where we can connect to images that truly are worth a thousand words. With time I believe that the emotions within ourselves that were painful or hard to give voice to will become easier to live with and may even open up to new interpretations as we live out new life experiences.

Like any detox, there is a period of going cold turkey. A period where every day seems like an up hill battle and you feel like running away from the parts of yourself that are broken and fragmented. But don’t give up. There is life, light and beauty in sitting with the darkest parts of ourselves. All you have to do is be courageous enough to try.