mastering your emotions: the taoist teaching (part 1/3)

Feb 10, 2016 | Other Popular Teachings

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summary

Discover the Taoist teaching on the true purpose of your emotional feelings, and how to positively manage them for an authentic and happy life.

This is part 1 of a three-part teaching series on how to master your mindset and emotions for an authentic and purpose filled life.

In this series we explore three key personal and spiritual lessons:

#1: Understanding the purpose of your emotional feelings and how to manage them.

#2: How your beliefs, thoughts and words create your life direction.

#3: Understanding ‘who is talking and who is listening’ – this means taking control of your self-talk and your mind.

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full teaching transcript

David James Lees:

I’d like to talk to you about the ‘illusion of confusion’… so what’s that I hear you ask! Well, perhaps we can begin with some questions…

  • Do you ever experience violent swings in your emotions?
  • Do you sometimes believe you are lost in a maze of conflicting thoughts and feelings?
  • Do you hear yourself saying negative statements or affirmations such as: “I feel overwhelmed’, ‘I can’t cope’, ‘I feel vulnerable’…

These are all based on misunderstandings, or what I describe as ‘illusion of confusion’, and are just some of the tricks and games your mind can play on you if you let it.

Even though you may casually repeat these types of statements to yourself or others, remember they are NOT the truth!

I hear many confused and untrue statements just like these every day in my work as a therapist and coach and I take them very seriously indeed, in fact, I call them: LIES.

The ancient Taoist masters also treated them with great importance and reverence. There are several classic Taoist teachings that emphasise the importance of ensuring that your words and self-talk are both truthful and authentic – here are just two of the better-known proverbs:

‘The words you use, become the house you live in’

and

‘The beginning of all wisdom is to call things by their correct name’

Even my old grandmother addressed this issue when she told me: “Be careful of what you wish for….!”

The lies you tell yourself, do have a profound impact on you.

Have you ever considered the harmful effect any negative affirmations have on your life and wellbeing?

The Taoists teach that ‘you can’t change what you don’t understand’, so I’d like to spend some time in this and my next two teachings, exploring some practical ways that you can begin to unravel the ‘illusion of confusion’, and reject the harmful misunderstandings, untruths and lies that your mind may sometimes offer you.

The subject of this teaching series is something that impacts everyone and this process will help restore a sense of balance, inner peace and a deeper connection to your authentic truth. I want you to choose to start living a spiritually guided life of love, happiness and purpose.

We’ll explore three main spiritual lessons in this teaching series:

#1: Learning to understand and control your emotional feelings.

#2: Discovering why your beliefs, thoughts and words create your life direction.

#3: Understanding ‘who is talking and who is listening’ – this means taking control of your self-talk and your mind.

Ok, so let’s explore the FIRST LESSON: how to understand and control your emotional feelings.

The most important teaching and personal meditation I want you to consider here is:

‘You are the creator of your emotional feelings, not the victim of them!’

This applies to all emotional feelings. Whether it is positive feelings, such as joy, happiness, bliss and love, what I label as ‘green light feelings’. Or it could be negative feelings, such as stress, anxiety, depression and panic attacks – these are what I label as ‘red light feelings’.

The point here is that emotional feelings do not float around like a virus waiting to attach themselves to you! They manifest from within you and they are a direct result of your thoughts and, on a deeper level, your core beliefs.

Understanding this principle is the doorway to emotional freedom – it really IS that powerful.

Once you accept this you can now CHOOSE to take control of your emotions and feelings.

First you need to learn how to mindfully separate your emotional feelings from the thoughts and beliefs that created them.

This may seem pretty basic, but it’s one of the most important and most difficult things to do. For instance, saying something as innocuous as: “I feel overwhelmed” creates a fundamental internal confusion between your feelings and beliefs, which actually increases your red light emotional feelings! Then, over time,’ I FEEL …’ becomes ‘I AM…’.

The reality is that there is no feeling called ‘overwhelmed’.

Remember, feelings are actually a physiological response within your body: sweaty palms; tightness in the chest, head, neck or shoulders; ‘butterflies’ or a churning in your stomach; weakness in your legs etc. These are all being created in response to your thoughts and mindset in any given moment.

A practical Wu Wei Wisdom technique that is very successful for my clients is to stop using the word “feel” … as in I FEEL overwhelmed, I FEEL unlovable, I FEEL not good enough’. Just ban the ‘F’ word!

Now, instead of saying ‘I FEEL’, replace it with one of these three more self-empowering words: “I THINK”, “I BELIEVE”, “I CHOOSE” … so for example: ‘I think I am overwhelmed’, ‘I believe I am unlovable’, ‘I choose to be not good enough’.

Your thinking, beliefs and choices should never contradict your inner truth, Shen (or inner spirit) and your divine, personal connection to the Tao and the Cosmos. So revising these statements in this way will make any contradictions, much more apparent.

What you are seeking here is a harmonious alignment between the energy of your non-physical, higher or spiritual self and that of your physical human mind, your thoughts and beliefs.

When you practice this reframing of your internal self-talk, shifting from ‘I FEEL’ to ‘I THINK… ‘I BELIEVE’…or ‘I CHOOSE’, it becomes a very powerful form of mindful meditation. It allows you to refocus your attention away from the surface feelings or emotions and how uncomfortable or painful these are, and onto the origin of the emotional feelings: your thoughts and beliefs.

If you find yourself saying: ‘I think I am overwhelmed’, ‘I believe I am unlovable’, ‘I choose to be not good enough’, or many other statements like this, which are actually totally misaligned with your spiritual truth, this then allows you to ask the profound self-enquiry question of: “why?”

The Chinese masters call this following the ‘golden thread’ to find the truth within.

You just keep on asking “why?”: ‘Why do I THINK I am overwhelmed’, ‘why I BELIEVE I am unlovable’ – where is the evidence for this? …. ‘Why do I CHOOSE to be not good enough’ – why do choose to accept I am lesser than anyone else?

Never say ‘oh, I don’t know why!’ or ‘it’s just the way I am’ – this is an avoidance, and one that I hear often with my clients!

Like hunting for the treasure trove of the authentic truth within you, you must tenaciously keep on following this self-enquiry thread until you find the root misunderstanding or lie.

When you reach this lie, well, congratulations – this is a significant progress. You’ve now uncovered a huge personal and spiritual lesson that needs to be lovingly addressed and resolved!

This leads me to the second step in the process of learning to understand and control your emotional feelings…

I would like you to now drop your shoulders, take a deep breath and meditate for a moment on the paradoxical idea that your emotional feelings are actually a blessing!

I must confide in you, the first time I heard this teaching from my Master, I thought that I had mistranslated his words. But, with deeper study and reflection, I now also use this wonderful teaching every day in my work.

Please consider the idea that your emotional feelings are an indication of whether you are connected or disconnected from your Shen, your inner spirit and inner-truth, and the wider Cosmos.

So, when you experience green light emotional feelings, such as love, bliss, happiness, joy, this tells you that you are fully connected to your true Shen and living authentically in harmony with the Tao and the Way of all things. When you experience red light emotional feelings, such as anxiety, depression, stress, panic attacks, you have disconnected from your Shen and have created a misalignment and disharmony with the Tao and Cosmos.

Any uncomfortable surface level red light feelings that you may experience are the starting point that will always tell you if there is a ‘lie’ buried within your subconscious mind.

This is the lie that creates disharmony within you at every energetic level. It causes you to mistrust, doubt and reject your divine truth and purpose, as well as your relationship with your spiritual Source (whatever you believe that Source to be).

Now you can begin to understand how powerful these lies can be! And you can also begin to appreciate how your emotions CAN be a blessing. But only IF you use them as a starting point for deeper, more mindful and loving personal self-inquiry, rather than as a self-harming stick to beat yourself with.

This Wu Wei Wisdom process of understanding and learning how to control your emotional feelings is what I call practical spirituality. It may represent a 360-degree paradigm shift from how you may have been taught to view your feelings and emotions, and this is not uncommon in the West.

This process will give you empowering insight and the ability to take control of your feelings and emotions. Remember: your emotional feelings are not your enemy, to be avoided. They are your best friend, to be embraced and used effectively.

Taking the time to do this work is an act of pure self-love and self-nurturing! It is the first step in helping you create an authentic, spiritual connected and purpose filled life.

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