Three Ways to Move Emotional Energy in the Body

For most of my life I suppressed emotions- especially anger, rage, and grief. I didn’t know that during the time- I thought I just never got angry. Anxiety, sadness, frustration- yes. But anger, rage, and grief- nope. It didn’t feel safe to feel those emotions.

Then I got really sick, which cracked me open- and all of the suppressed emotions came out with a vengeance. It was intense, uncomfortable, and overwhelming.

I didn’t know how to feel and process anger, grief, or other emotions in a healthy way. Unfortunately, it’s not something many of us are taught at home or in school. Or at all.

It wasn’t until I got really sick that I learned the relationship between emotions and physical symptoms- trapped emotions can actually manifest as physical symptoms, and over time, trapped emotions can create disturbances in our energy field that prevent us from healing.

Actually starting to feel my feelings was ugly, messy, and painful. I mean, who wants to be laying on the bathroom floor, curled into a ball, hysterically crying because a deep overwhelming sadness knocked you over? Who wants to be laying in bed, shaking with anger with no energy to get up and release it? Who wants to frustrated, anxious, depressed, and overwhelmed, all at the same time?!

And worst of all, who wants to feel all of these emotions when you barely have the energy to stand up, take a walk, or even breathe?! And when you are in excruciating pain?!

But as I started to actually sit with these emotions and let them come up, they always passed after a while, and I would feel better- lighter and freer. The phrase “feeling is healing” is true. It’s not fun, it’s not easy, and it’s not pleasant. But it is healing and liberating. And I definitely noticed improvements in my physical symptoms.

There are three ways to help move emotional energy in the body- movement, breath, and sound.

Movement- this can look like shaking, jumping up and down, dancing, walking, yoga, stretching

Breath- I start each morning with a few minutes of breathwork (using the Pause Breathwork App) and do longer sessions about 1x a week. There are different patterns for different emotions, but something you can always do is take long, deep inhales through the nose and long deep exhales through the mouth.

Sound- I take long sigh breaths (taking a deep breath in through the nose and sigh it all out), scream into a pillow, or make whatever noises feel good to me in the moment.

Incorporating all three of these- individually or at the same time- even just for a few minutes- has been a game changer.

Try these and let me know if you feel a shift!