The retreatLast weekend, I participated in a 3-day retreat about emotions. I thought it’d be good for me because I tend to be blocked with feeling emotions and I knew the organizer is a very good therapist.
As the date was coming, I was reticent and lazy. A bit afraid of being uncomfortable, or even worse for me, vulnerable.
But the weekend started very well. There were very nice people, mostly French and Argentinian, and we connected quite easily.
We learned about how emotions work and what they are for, and we did exercises to notice where in our bodies we feel different emotions. This would all seem very straightforward to me, but I was quite surprised about some observations and experiences people shared. Some people couldn’t feel joy. Others were unable to connect to anger.
I learned about disassociation, which is what happens when your rational mind decides to cut communications with your emotions and go numb. And also about how our nervous system responds to a situation that takes us our of our regulated balanced state. A situation that causes this rupture could be something very small like our listener getting distracted or somebody asking us a question we don’t know.
The last day, we went deeper into a painful memory of our childhood or teenage years. I want to share this with you because of how mind-blowing it was.
The exercise consisted on a guided meditation to try to relive that moment. Going back to it with an open mind, and letting the emotions flow.
During the past couple of years, I’ve noticed that I’m not getting any better at managing being the center of attention of a large group. It’s as hard as it always has been. I dislike public speaking because I feel awful with the anticipation of doing it and also while I’m speaking. That hasn’t stopped me from proactively putting myself in that situation, to try to get practice and get over it. But I haven’t gotten over it. And so during the last year, I had the realization that it’s probably a deeper trauma that I can’t overcome by brute force alone.
And so for the exercise, I picked one particular scene in which I was bullied. I don’t even remember much of it, but the therapist said that was good enough to work with.
At first, I didn’t feel anything, but after a few minutes of focused guided envisioning, I started feeling things I didn’t know I had inside me. To my disbelief, I found myself furious. I became so angry with those kids that bullied me back in school, that I really felt like beating the shit out of them. Other bad bullying memories came to mind, and that fueled my anger even more.
The guided meditation took me from that furious state to a heartbreaking sadness, that completely took over me. I’ve rarely felt so sad before. Eventually, I imagined myself giving a hug to my inner child, surrounded by good friends protecting me, and I felt renewed.
This was a breakthrough experience, because I didn’t know I had those emotions in me. Before, it seemed that those memories carried no emotion. But I realize now that they did carry emotion, but I was so disassociated from them that I just didn’t feel anything anymore.
Probably, my unconscious mind still remembers those experiences, so whenever I become the center of attention in a large group, I can’t control it. My body screams “danger” and I get very nervous and afraid. After this experience, I realize that to start healing from this, first I must let these emotions flow so I can decompress, like a pressure valve, before I can start building a new reality for my unconscious mind.
Today it’s been a week since the retreat. I feel great, more open to people and to myself. I can’t help but smile about the liberation I felt after the exercise. In practical terms, it’s already been useful to be open to my emotions. Thanks to that, I’ve had some valuable thoughtful conversations this week, and I’ve put limits to preserve my well-being without feeling guilt.
This was my experience, and I think it’s worth sharing, so here I am writing you about it.
Your experience would be different. But I obviously would encourage anyone to start or continue their journey into learning about themselves and unblocking their repressed emotions. Each person might have a different way to do it safely. For me, participating in a group retreat with this particular therapist has nailed it. Definitely, the style of the therapist matching my own was the main enabler. But also, probably it was the environment, surrounded by soothing nature. Maybe also it was the fact of being outside the city for a few days, because it was easier to slow down. Maybe it was the human connection as well, that reminds me of the summer camps where I made wonderful friendships.
