There's nothing more empty than a life without emotions, and there's nothing more difficult than spending your life running from emotions.

I know because I've been there.

What if I told you there is a way that you can stop running from your emotions healthily and stably, and you can even embrace those emotions? I know that may sound difficult if you have an unstable mindset, but I know it's possible because I did it myself.

With that in mind, today I'm going to be sharing with you:

🌟 Three tried and tested techniques to stop running from your emotions

🌟 Why emotions aren't so bad after all

🌟 How you can do it at a pace that suits you, not scares you

Now if you're here, I imagine that you're quite interested in getting better from CPTSD. So before we dive in, I have left a link to access a free guide sharing the six steps I took to recover from my CPTSD so that you don't have to figure them out yourself. If you think that would help you, head to this link to access it!

Ready? Let's go...

Technique 1 - Find Time to Pause

The number one way that you can stop running from your emotions is by finding time to pause. I know this is scary for most people with complex PTSD because when you stop, all of the emotions come flooding back. So... I'm not saying you need to sit with your emotions for hours, just take a moment to pause and do what feels right.

I've heard that you should spend 1 minute of every hour sitting in silence and reflecting on your emotions to process everything that just happened in those past 59 minutes. I know that's a lot for most people and it may not be feasible to set an alarm once every hour to do that, but try and find something that works for you.

Even if it's one minute a day and your only purpose is to sit there and watch your emotions. How do you feel? What's coming through? Do you have physical sensations? Is it all emotional? Is it in your body? Watch it, let it go, and then move on with your day.

The idea is that you just pause and start letting your emotions be present (which, by the way, is not running from emotions) and that means you can get back on track with your life.

Technique 2 - Change Your Perspective on Emotions

The second thing you can do to stop running from your emotions is to change the perspective through which you see your emotions. That means realizing the emotions don't control you, the emotions won't become too overwhelming, and the emotions will go.

Emotions come and emotions go, and it's the same for every emotion. So yes, that applies to happiness. Sadly, you're not going to be happy forever, but you can permit yourself to enjoy that moment because it will pass. This also applies to sadness, anxiety, or depression. The emotion will be there but no matter how bad it seems, it will pass.

To do this exercise, I recommend you set an alarm once every hour, ideally at the same moment that you choose to pause and wait with your emotions. When that alarm goes off, you record a number on a scale from 0 to 10 illustrating how you feel. 0 is the worst in the world, and 10 is the best you've ever been.

Repeat that over a week, and then at the end of that period, you can look back and see how your emotions have changed, how none of them ever stuck around, and it can change your perspective of how you deal with emotions.

If you know they're gonna go, when they turn up, you won't feel as overwhelmed anymore.

It's simple, but it works.

Technique 3 - Create a Halfway House for Overwhelming Emotions

The third way you can stop running from your emotions is by noticing what you do when your emotions are overwhelming and changing that to be a "Halfway House".

When you feel overwhelmed by emotions, you will have a coping strategy. For me, I just threw myself into work. You couldn't talk to me, you couldn't see me, I just worked, worked, worked.

I realized that for as long as I was working, I wasn't processing any of my emotions. That meant that they were trapped inside of me and they came out in an ugly way. People told me that I should meditate or do yoga so I could release those emotions but that didn't work for me because they felt so overbearing that I became even more scared to go there.

Instead, I found a halfway house. This is an activity that meant I didn't stop completely, but it wasn't "work hard" either. It was something in the middle. This activity allowed free space in my mind to feel those emotions whilst I was still busy doing something.

My halfway house was cooking. When I was cooking, it was simple enough that I had some instructions to follow, but it was basic enough that my brain was still active. Over the hour that I was cooking, I could calm down and the emotions stopped being so scary. They started becoming manageable.

In your case, you can decrease the physical aspect of that halfway house so it becomes less physically engaging and creates more space for emotional processing. For example, after cooking became comfortable, I moved to listening to music whilst laying on my bed. Eventually, I turned that into laying on my bed and being present with those emotions.

This process takes time and you shouldn't jump in straight away but it is an example of how you can stop running from your emotions and heal from Complex PTSD.

So, What's The Takeaway?

Those are the three steps that you can take to stop running from your emotions. Not particularly revolutionary, but they do require you to put in the effort each day and give it a go. If you do, you can embrace your emotions and spend less time running from them. You can spend more time doing what you love, heal from CPTSD, and move on with your life.

Before you go, I figured if you're here, then you are interested in healing from CPTSD or at least learning more. So, I have left a link to a resource I've created. It's free and it explains the six steps I used to heal from my CPTSD and I'm sharing them with you. So if you'd like to heal from your CPTSD, head over there, have a read, and see if it's useful for you.

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