I think the way you understand and manage your emotions... is wrong.

And not just you, but also the people who raised you and your friends, your

classmates, your boss, um, your coworkers.

Pretty much everybody.

I think they're all wrong to be brutally honest, if I haven't

been honest enough already.

I know that's a bold claim, but I will explain.

I also wanna point you in what I think is the right direction

and give you a couple of specific things you can do starting today.

Hey, I'm Justin Sunseri.

If I haven't scared you away already, I'm a therapist and coach who helps

you live more calmly, confidently, and connected without psychobabble or woo woo.

Welcome to Stuck Not Broken.

This podcast of course, is not therapy, nor do I intend it to replace therapy.

A couple of conversations came up recently in my one-on-one client work.

This conversation also comes up within the Untucking Academy during live events

like um, skills practices or q and as.

It centers on how we understand our emotions and how to approach them.

The answer I had for those two clients is the same uh, for the

academy and I'll give it to you now.

As they both told me, this is different and weird, and, and they're right.

I'll assume you'll have the same reaction.

You're gonna think it's weird.

But as I walked them through an emotional regulation exercise, they saw the

benefit of doing things the weird way.

They both saw their difficult emotions soften and eventually,

um, not even be present.

So what's the common wisdom when it comes to understanding our emotions?

I don't think we commonly give it much consideration at all.

How often do we talk about our emotions with other people or

even reflect on our emotions?

When we do, we describe our emotions as problems, things that need

to go away un unless of course the emotions feel good, right?

We describe our emotions maybe as a chemical imbalance, which is a

hypothesis to put a kindly that is pretty much debunked at this point, though.

That's probably a whole other episode.

Or we describe our emotions as the result of the way we think.

If we could just think differently, then we'd feel better.

There are entire cognitive-based therapies, and I'm sure coaching

programs, uh, grounded in this idea that cognitions lead to emotions.

The self-help field relies on changing your cognitions, which in theory

leads to a change in your emotions.

We might understand our emotions as something that happens to us, like a

virus or some sort of affliction, and we definitely look at our emotions like

they're a disorder that we fall victim to.

We understand emotions as a sign of weakness, uh, lack

of control or irrationality.

Emotions may be lumped into categories of positive and negative.

We may look at emotions as an individual experience, a burden belonging to that

one person rather than an accumulation of life context, which involve many people.

And we may look at emotions as something that requires immediate reaction, like,

we need to do something reactively.

Okay?

So that was a lot, but tell me I'm wrong.

And I didn't even get into general or even specific cultural or

religious pieces of emotions.

And there's even philosophies like stoicism that rely on

correcting our thinking in order to make our emotions better.

So I, I think you get the idea.

That's how we generally understand our emotions.

Now, how do we deal with them?

Or rather how do we, uh, not deal with them?

I'll bet you do one of, at least one of the following five things.

Number one, resisting your emotions through one of many possible means, like

suppressing them, pushing them down, and trying not to think about them.

Resisting your emotions can look like shoulding or questioning yourself,

sounding like, why do I feel this way?

Or, I shouldn't feel this way?

Resisting can also look like arguing with the emotion, like telling ourselves

it's irrational, trying to use logic to make it go away or outright,

aggressively telling it to go away.

Number two is ignoring your emotions through distraction like

doom, scrolling, binge-eating, uh, partying, watching TV and so on.

Or ignoring your emotions through minimizing them, convincing yourself

it's not a big deal or downplaying it.

Number three, you may deal with emotions through behavioral adaptations.

These are things that we do to cope with the emotions we struggle to feel like

the things that I mentioned earlier, doom scrolling and binge eating and so on.

But these can also be addictions, oversleeping, and on and

on, and like tons of things.

Any behavior to numb or keep our mind off our emotions, even lashing out at others.

Number four, you may intellectualize your emotions.

Rather than feeling them.

You explain them, you categorize them.

Number five, seeking perpetual external validation for your emotions.

This kind of recognizes your emotions, but it's unending and it's based on the

external validation of somebody else.

That's only five.

There's probably a ton more I can put in here.

And I'll stop it at that, but you probably can fit into at least a couple

of those and not just you, all of us.

We have two problems here.

One is the way you understand your emotions, which is a

top down cognitive issue.

Another problem is how you manage your emotions, which is a behavioral issue.

You can make changes in either problem, cognitive or behavioral,

and see some benefit, sure.

I think addressing our thoughts and behaviors is the least sustainable and

most difficult path to change, personally.

Think of it like this.

Trying to change your emotions by changing your thoughts is like trying

to change the smoke to stop a fire.

Obviously the smoke is a problem, but it's not the problem.

And even if we could somehow change the smoke, like channeling all of it out one

window, maybe, the fire is still going.

And I think that's why it's so difficult to change emotions by focusing on thoughts

or behaviors because the fire, the emotion is still there and it doesn't go anywhere.

It just stays there.

Growing.

Festering.

Clients always intuitively know this and I will go ahead and

assume that you do as well.

You can of course see change through altering thoughts and behaviors.

Best of luck to you.

However, I recommend a third option, which I have found to lead to sustainable

changes in emotional regulation that doesn't rely on behavioral coping or

trying to change the way that you think.

Our emotions aren't just a way of thinking, and they

aren't just a way of behaving.

I argue that our thoughts and behaviors are a result of our emotions.

Yeah, they affect each other.

They reinforce each other.

But emotion seems to be the driving force of thoughts and behavior.

Basically, if our emotions change, so do our thoughts and behaviors.

When you're relaxed, you're not ruminating about what someone said at work, right?

And when you're joyful, you're way less likely to engage in like doom scrolling.

Emotions are something different.

There's something that exists in our bodies.

We can feel them.

We can identify where they come from in our body and also what they need.

For example, when we feel angry, it's not just a state of being in the brain, it,

it is something that permeates through us.

We feel more energized.

We feel heat, maybe tension.

And if you pay attention, you'll probably notice a shorter breathing into the chest.

The chest is where a lot of action happens with anger, particularly,

uh, chest and upper body.

Not only can you feel the emotion and where it lives in the body,

but it's possible to identify what the emotion wants to do.

I say "what the emotion wants to do," but really, I mean, what your body wants

to do, what you identify as an emotion is really just the conscious experience

of some sort of activation in your body.

When your sympathetic fight system is active, for example, your body shifts

its processes to prioritize aggression.

You feel this as the anger emotion, but underneath the anger emotion is the body's

state of sympathetic fight activation.

Emotions drive thoughts and behaviors, but the state of the body drives the emotion.

The state of the body is the primary factor.

If you can change your body's state, then your emotions change.

And so do your thoughts and your behaviors as well.

So how do you change your emotions through changing your body state?

I am not saying it's easy, but I can explain how to do it.

And this brings me back to where I began with my two clients, the ones

who thought these ideas are weird.

And yeah, they're rights, they are weird, they're different.

Both of these clients were men who had high stress, which showed up as anger.

That's just a coincidence.

I apply these ideas and techniques to a wide range of clients.

These two just so happened to have the same conversation with me,

and I think the same week, and have the same presenting problems.

And both be men.

I told them they need to actually pay attention to how

they feel and stop rejecting.

Stop explaining.

Stop minimizing.

pay attention to their anger and their stress.

When we pay attention to our emotions, it becomes a portal to change our state.

As our state changes, the emotions soften or can even resolve.

To change your state, you need to connect with the experience

of your body mindfully.

Use your emotions as a portal to connect with your body's state.

If we use the anger example again, you would mindfully connect with

the body's experience of anger.

You would give it permission to be there.

After permitting the anger, you would then direct your attention to the

present moment experience of anger and, and how it shows up in your body.

The goal is not to get rid of the anger.

The goal is to connect with the anger.

When you connect with the anger, it gives your body the

opportunity to self-regulate.

In other words, it opens the potential for your state- your body's state- to shift.

I know you're assuming it'll get worse if you pay attention to your motions.

Um, that's common and that's what the two clients thought as well.

Um, you know, probably, uh, nearly all my clients do the first time they hear this.

Same with the Unstuck Academy students.

I get it.

And it's okay to have that trepidation.

The essential piece of this is to only begin paying attention to your

emotions when you have a sense of grounding in the present moment.

You'll know you're grounded because you'll feel a sense of connection

with yourself, uh, maybe with others, or with your environment.

You'll be in tune with your senses.

You'll be curious about what's happening internally.

This sense of groundedness comes from your body's state of safety.

It's your body's built-in safety system using the ventral vagal pathways from

your brainstem that that's what helps you to feel grounded and connected.

Probably too much information, but there you go.

When your brainstem detects that it's safe, it will shift your body state

toward the ventral vagal safety state.

It's totally okay if you get here to retain this state, just kind of,

and kind of like marinate in it.

If you aren't ready to challenge your safety state, I

don't blame you, that's fine.

But when you get there, it's the perfect opportunity to mindfully

connect with your other emotions like anger, or anxiety, or even depression.

Another key thing is to ensure you are maintaining access to your

safety state when you get there and if you're gonna challenge it

by feeling something uncomfortable.

While mindfully connecting with something like anger, you always

wanna check on your breath, take an extended exhale here and there.

Uh, maybe have a fidget to connect with.

And cues of safety around you, like silence or, or music, um, a

soft texture or maybe even a scent that you like, like a candle.

As you practice this skill, you'll strengthen your body's safety state.

As those ventral vagal pathways strengthen your other emotions,

the uncomfortable ones will soften and even release or leave.

It's possible to see benefit from even one of these exercises, but the real

benefit comes from a proactive practice, um, just like you're building a skill

or the strength of anything else.

Let's talk about what to do next.

What I described, uh, already might be a bit much, and that's normal and that's

okay, but we need to start somewhere.

I find the best place to start is trying to get in touch

with your body's safety state.

Even small moments can have a big, big impact.

So I invite you to do something you enjoy, like eating a blueberry or smelling a

candle or touching a certain blanket.

But- do do that thing.

But notice how it feels.

Don't just do the thing that you like.

Notice how it affects your body.

What happens in your breathing?

What happens in your muscles?

Are, are they more tense or more relaxed?

Another easy way to practice is to extend your exhale in one

mindful and intentional breath.

Take in one breath, let it out slowly, focusing on the way

your body feels as you exhale.

Now, these two little ideas don't solve the emotional problem that you

have, but they help you get in touch with your body's potential for safety.

And it does start the process of building more safety within your system.

And that's, that's a good thing.

We want more of that.

Thank you so much for joining me on Stuck Not Broken.

I hope this episode has helped you think about your emotions differently and

given you a couple ideas on what you can do differently, even starting today.

I have another next step for you and it's free.

It's called Your Next Steps.

It's a free course in the Untucking Academy and it collects my

essential podcast episodes that I think you should start with.

This, uh, foundational knowledge helps you lay, well, lay a

foundation for you to build from.

If things click for you, your next steps may open up after that.

So use the link in the description to access it for free today.

Thanks again.

Bye.