Be a fine boutique, not a second-hand shop

Self-expression has been, for a long time, a fearsome territory to me.

And yet, I’ve come to realise that it is perhaps, the only means to true liberation.

When life is taking us through difficult times and emotions, if we don’t get to understand what it is that we feel, where the source of that feeling is, how it changes our essence at any given time and if we are also, unable to express and externalise (mindfully) all that in some way, we have only one choice and that is - to store it within.

With-in.

Once in, it sits in some dark corner of our subconscious and the decay begins to change its face, its voice, it gives it another name, and makes it forget how it got there in the first place.

But our little, stored friend is a die-hard hero and it never actually dies.

All it wants is to get out, into that airy and wide open space of communication and understanding. Of sharing. Of feeling.

And once it decides it wants out, be ready to welcome tears for no reason, grief for no loss, anger for no need, sadness with no meaning. The list goes on.

Dear reader – each time something happens that makes your heart forget its rhythm, your stomach tie into a knot, your chest lose its air, where possible, make a point of sitting down and asking yourself – WHAT is it that I feel?

Where does this feeling reside within me, within my body, right now?

Have I felt this way before? If so, when?

What happens if I make my breath pass through the area I feel this in now, for a few minutes?

How does the feeling change?

Can I soften all of me within and still allow ‘it’ to be there? How does that change its essence?

Can I ask it a question?

Can I allow it to answer?

Ask anything that comes to mind but just keep asking.

Keep asking until something within you shifts, changes, softens, melts, lightens, clears a path or swims to the surface.

This is how we allow emotions to play out their course and this is how we transform them - from unwelcome monsters, into wise companions.

Doing this, helps us not turn our inner world into some dingy, second-hand shop, stocked up with items that all seem out of place and were often damped there as someone else could no longer bear to own them.

Doing this, helps us create our own exclusive inner boutique, where the shelves are filled with items that we have chosen specifically, for their value to our well-being, our self-love and our inner peace.