EMOTIONAL REALISATION
Coming to understand something clearly and distinctly such that change is inevitable.
Our thoughts, feelings and emotions reflect our sense of well-being and how we feel about ourselves. As we grow up and development physically and emotionally the experiences that we have shape and change them. This is the process of conditioning. We might have learned to be wary of the world, to feel anxious and negative about the future, or we might have had a very loving and supportive upbringing that enables us to feel confident and positive about our life. When we look closely at ourselves in meditation practice we can begin to see how powerful our conditioning, operating at the level of the subconscious mind, can be. We can begin to feel how our conditioned reflexes control us and will continue to do so until they are identified, understood and released. The process of emotional realisation is about developing a thorough understanding of our thoughts, feelings and emotions, where they come from and how our conditioning works.
While you are reading this article you might find it useful to reflect on the thoughts, feelings and emotions that you are experiencing right now and on how these vary during the day. Are there thoughts, feelings and emotions that you routinely suppress or grasp on to and if so, do you have any idea why? Could this suppression and grasping be part of your conditioning? Mindfulness meditation practice trains us to allow everything that we are experiencing to be welcomed into our awareness and be fully acknowledged. When we do this, and it’s not easy, we are allowing feelings and emotions to rise up and be accepted just as they are even if we feel a very strong aversion to them. Being with them in this way facilitates the development of a sense of opening through which the energy of emotion can flow out of the mind and the body. In allowing the mind to open such release of energy can enable us to feel how and from where the emotion arises, in other words to begin to realise our conditioning.
But beware – coming to understand something clearly and distinctly is an emotional or feeling process that allows things to change. It is not an intellectual exercise. In meditation practice we let go of our thoughts and we allow ourselves to feel. Only by practising in this way can emotional realisation occur.
