Thursday, February 16, 2012

Redefining Strength

Nancy Colier wrote a great article for the Huffington Post called: True Strength - Learning to Feel What Is. In it, she describes the pattern most of us have when it comes to painful or stressful emotions -  to pretend that they do not exist. In doing so, we create a sort of monster. These unexpressed feelings are currents of energy within our body, an energy that impacts our health. Both our mental and physical states of well being may suffer when feelings are left unattended. That is exactly what they need - attention. Painful emotions, such as anger, sadness or angst must be given conscious attention. In the light of consciousness, darkness can no longer be.


I think that we need to give a new meaning to word "strength" to include emotional awareness. We would do well to revere those who are conscious of their pain and, in fact, learn something of value from it and ultimately transcend it. Someone who is emotionally strong should not be equated to one who conceals their feelings but one who gives witness and expression to them. Remember, we are not our emotions and feelings are neither good nor bad, they simply are. What really defines us is our resulting action. To be truly strong is to feel the sadness or anger with a sense of peaceful detachment and non-judgement and to act in a compassionate, truthful way.


grace & gratitude,
Kevin







2 comments:

  1. Hi
    I have been following your blog for a while, I thought of you and wondered what you were up to, Twitter did its job and got me right at your door step!!
    I couldn't be happier to be able to get a bit of you via your blog.
    When i read, its weird i can hear your voice saying word by word.
    You seem happy! I am happy for you.

    Best wishes for 2012


    Keep writing, you are good at it!


    :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks for the comment :-) I'm glad Twitter did its job! It looks like happiness is circular because yours brings mine :-)

    Kevin

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