I woke up this morning with an intense feeling of dread.
This is not normal for me as I usually wake up with a feeling of excited anticipation for the day ahead, not an anxious feeling of impending doom.
I felt light headed, like the feeling you get when you’re overly hungry, except my stomach was full of cement.
The first thing I did was check in with the present moment, go within and ask “what’s this feeling about?” Taking long, deep breaths and silencing my mind, I waited for an answer. But the more I sat in the feeling, allowing it and not resisting it, the stronger the dread became and waves of nausea washed over me, forcing me to run to the bathroom to throw up.
I then called my beloved, who’d already been at work for an hour, and said, “please don’t take any risks today,” but deep down, I knew that whatever’s meant to happen will happen regardless of how safe and cautious he, or anyone, is. It was a futile grasp for control and I knew it but I did it anyway because I wanted to feel in control even though I knew I wasn’t.
That sense of control quickly faded as soon as I hung up and the foreboding unease increased ten fold, rising up powerfully within my body and being, and I noticed my mind was starting to make up possible gloomy scenarios of what might happen and running through a list of people in my life and who something bad could happen to today.
I know how this plays out all too well. Been there, done that. The highly sensitive mind has an innate tendency to consider all possible outcomes as well as ruminate about things endlessly. We also like to analyze things from every angle so we can understand it better. It’s easy for a sensitive soul to get carried away by their thoughts and emotions if they haven’t practiced grounding themselves, mindfulness and staying in their own true power.
I didn’t want to end up like this:
So I turned to the quickest and easiest disruptor to let the energy of dread (or any powerful emotion) flow through me without getting lost in the thoughts and feelings of it: EXERCISE.
Moving your body physically is a great way to release any powerful emotion, allowing it to flow through rather than getting stuck in us. It transforms it from a raging river to a trickling stream so that you can better process and understand it without getting swept away in its current. And exercise doesn’t require any inner work such as changing your mindset, witnessing or self-reflection.
I grabbed the dogs, put on my shoes and went for a brisk walk outside.
But don’t think my mind didn’t try to wander off into the bad possibilities that might happen while on a walk… What if there’s a coyote and it attacks my dogs? What if a car doesn’t see me and runs over us? What if I have a heart attack and die in the middle of the field and no one finds me? What if a plane falls from the sky and crashes on us? What if the very act of trying to release the feelings of doom actually causes the thing of doom to happen?
My mind went to all those places and more before I was able to reign it back in, put a leash on it and take it for a walk alongside the dogs.
Nature is also a powerful calmer-downer of intense energy. Being in the stillness and unconditional acceptance of the trees, flowers or sky can immediately calm one’s energy. When I returned home, I was back to my normal, centered self and could acknowledge the dread without getting lost in it or being fearful of it.
I still have a feeling of dread but it’s not intense or overpowering as it was early this morning. It’s more like a subtle pulsing rather than a throbbing fury, and much more manageable. Now I can process the energy while remaining grounded. I don’t want to transmute it because it’s here for a reason. Our emotions, especially the random, unexpected and powerful ones that come out of nowhere, bring gifts of messages for us. Whether it’s something we’re ready to bring to light, an unresolved or unconscious issue, a loving forewarning of things to come, or a communication someone’s imparting on us, if we can center ourselves enough to acknowledge, allow and honor it, we just might receive the gift.
Very good advice — that I needed to read today! Now to go for a walk. 🙂
I’m always out in nature to calm and soothe myself, I need it like the air that I breathe. And you are right, nature can diffuse such feelings, however, the pulsing you mentioned, is almost always my companion. I can’t shake it off, but it doesn’t bother me so much anymore. I made some kind of peace with it even though I wished I could experience more worry-free moments. I don’t have anxiety anymore, but all in all I seem to get more sensitive the older I get, and things get to me way more intense than they used to. I don’t freak out because of it anymore, I’m only a bit sad that this is my life, obviously.
Did you ever understand what caused the anxiety? Does that happen frequently? How do you know where that feeling is coming from? I’m just curious about whether these feelings are sometimes telling us something or are we picking up a collective energy. Exercise helps me too. How, though, do we know when to actually pay attention to this overwhelming feeling and be with it to understand what it’s telling us? Sorry if I’m bombarding you with questions but it’s in my nature to be curious.
Hey Renee. Great questions! Those feelings usually don’t run through me, at least not as powerfully as they did this morning. I have been feeling a sense of them lately but recognize it’s from the collective emotional state of our current world with Covid-19, racial, civic and political unrest along with our natural disasters and fires, etc. Our globe is in a period of heightened energetic unrest, uncertainty and fear and as an empath and sensitive soul, many of us are affected by it even more so because we feel the energy of others along with our own. But if you know how to discern if the feelings are coming from you vs someone else, you can feel it without getting lost in it or even have to do anything with it other than recognize it’s someone else’s energy.
For me personally today, I don’t know where it came from yet. I have a hunch but the day’s not over. 😉 It feels much different than the overall unrest I’ve been feeling emanating from our society, it feels personal. It takes practice to be able to discern if it’s something that’s for you to feel personally or if you’re simply picking up others’ energy, but once you can tell the difference, you’ll be able to more easily receive the message if there’s one meant for you. I always recommend being with ANY emotion you’re experiencing (whether it comes from yourself or others), because the more you do this, the more you’ll be able to distinguish the difference between yours and someone else’s. Hope this helps!
Thank You. I just tried this today and it helped.
You’re welcome! Glad it helped, and kudos to you for trying it! 🙂