What helps you connect to your feelings?

[MrMoonlight]

Therapy
Music
Posting reading here
Being outdoors

 

[Kalm Kamaal]

I wanted to ask everyone what techniques they use to connect with their body/feelings?
for me being seated is good but being in bed laying down flat really works! Most of my feelings and somatics are at a volume of about a 1 and my busy day of running keeps these feelings at a distance. I wondered if anyone else has a technique they use?
thank u!

Moving slowly on soft grass, taking in deep breaths and feeling confident and good about myself is what helps me.

Therapy
Music
Posting reading here
Being outdoors

Indeed, apt, therapy and music comes in handy very much.

Taking to trusted friends, journaling, and oddly, the most effective = singing!

I sing and dance and imagine I am some superstar entertaining a massive audience. There is this strange but sweet connection to self that comes with this practice

 

[Widow_of_one]

I sing and dance and imagine I am some superstar entertaining a massive audience. There is this strange but sweet connection to self that comes with this practice

Omg! I do the same thing and my interview by Oprah!!!

And, I was watching “A star is born” and while listening to lady Gaga sing I was able to connect with an issue I had experienced “without connecting to my feelings” SUDDENLY I connected!!

 

[life_is_suffering]

Music, meditation, working out (post-workout depression), most of the time I'm trying to escape, but since COVID it's been about half and half

 

[Widow_of_one]

Covid has really knocked me out too!

 

[life_is_suffering]

Covid has really knocked me out too!

Ya before COVID I relied on partying to help me self-medicate, now that I can't party anymore, I'm pretty much forced to look inside myself more often than not and attempt to heal it since I'm alone all the time now.

 

[Deanna]

My mom was a schitzophrenic as well and I think it just makes it harder to connect.( at all) but journaling is really good. I take my share of medications but it takes real effort to connect with my feelings. I seem to do real well at home with my ?. (Probably because we've been home-bound for awhile) An animal, something familiar, journaling and I exercise to connect.

Therapy
Music
Posting reading here
Being outdoors

I would have not considered posting here a way to connect, but now I do! Thanks, Mr. M! ? I always think about getting my therapy here, every day! What a ?!

 

[katz]

A long walk by myself, to process and relax, or cry if I need to. And an unusual one... I actually feel safer sitting on the floor. I can talk about my feelings better from there. Kind of like sitting up against a wall and feeling protected.

 

[Teasel]

Seeing them in others.

I guess you'd call that representation?

Watched a couple documentaries in the past week that were so powerful for me. On the record and Lorena. Related so much and was so inspired by those women :)

 

[skgcalm]

I have no techniques! So this thread and people's techniques are helpful.
Feelings are relatively new in some sense in that I'm allowing them and not constantly banishing them. I'm trying to be more conscious about feelings and have started asking myself questions like "what is this feeling" and "why am I behaving like this". But I'm finding I had to look at the feelings wheel that someone posted on a thread on here somewhere to really think about all the feelings there are (not that I don't know them but just to try and *think* more about what it is I am feeling.).

What do you do when you are in nature, or talking to God, or doing yoga or the techniques you use? How does that connect you to your feelings and body? Because in my head if I'm in nature I just think I'm in nature. I'm busy being in nature and avoiding feelings! If that makes sense!

I think I'm in the beginner phase of this.

My feelings, if I'm understanding the feelings you're referring to, are usually triggered by emotional flashbacks. When they occur I try to be quiet, calm and breath deeply and slowly to feel how my body is reacting to the feelings. It works most of the time to calm me down.

 

[Movingforward10]

My feelings, if I'm understanding the feelings you're referring to, are usually triggered by emotional flashbacks. When they occur I try to be quiet, calm and breath deeply and slowly to feel how my body is reacting to the feelings. It works most of the time to calm me down.

Thanks @skgcalm , I have recently been trying the same thing. It's challenging though. Feelings are pesky little creatures!

 

[skgcalm]

Thanks @skgcalm , I have recently been trying the same thing. It's challenging though. Feelings are pesky little creatures!

Thank you. I guess that I'm lucky at this stage of my life. I have the luxury of re-creating the isolation and loneliness that I felt as a child. I have been living in a camper for several months with very little human interaction. I've done this intentionally because it has helped to amplify my emotions. Making it much easier for me to feel them coming on and to identify them. So, I don't have the normal distractions of every day life and work that can complicate that process. I feel that I have made great progress but it has been very painful.