I will start with getting straight to the point might this blogpost be a long one…: I just freed myself from suffering by letting go of putting a meaning to overwhelming emotions I have been having for decades.
If you are not a romantic or never experienced deep (romantic) feelings for someone this might not be your read. However, this technique can be applied to every area in your life when you find yourself stuck in a loop of thoughts and emotions and you feel like you tried to put them to rest in every way possible, yet they keep resurfacing to an extent of exhaustion and frustration.
As I wrote just above, for the longest of times, decades, I have been experiencing overwhelming thoughts and feelings for someone I used to be in a romantic relationship with. I remember when the relationship ended I was devastated. I had never felt pain like that. Nor could I understand why something as beautiful as love could hurt so much.
I considered this person the love of my life. Whatever that even meant or means in my conceivable reality. And I still do. Even though we both moved on in our own way.
Nevertheless for over 2 decades I have never forgotten about him. The way he looked, walked, smelled, talked, laughed…All the things we shared and did together. How he made me feel. And how safe and loved I felt being myself around him. He was my rock as I started getting to grips with all the traumatic experiences I had been through up until then. For I now know that that was the time the symptoms of my mental illnesses showed up more and more.
Within these last 2 decades, every now and then I experience periods of intense thoughts and feelings about him. These are totally involuntary, originating from a subconscious level. It always starts with him showing up in my dreams. Next I see him in random people I meet and constantly feel waves of deep feelings for him as I go through my day. I sense his energy as if he is with me. This all resulting in me getting very emotional and feeling confused. With it also comes sadness, frustration and anger towards myself. I feel like a fool for still having him emotionally, energetically and mentally in my life, while he really isn’t there, nor is there actual reciprocation or any reason I should validate those thoughts and feelings. It is just me.
These last few days I have been experiencing all the above, yet again. And just now, as I was on my walk it hit me…
All this time I had been trying to put a meaning to him appearing in my dreams so vividly. Him being on my mind all day or me so deeply feeling for him and fantasizing about him in all ways possible. Or even seeing him in people I meet.
It frustrated me that after more than 2 decades I still thought and felt so strongly about him. I kept thinking that this must be for a reason and that it meant something. That it meant that something was wrong. Either I didn’t process our relationship and break up well enough, or I hadn’t let him really go. Or that there was still hope. Or that I was stuck in an over romanticized memory that actually never was. Whatever it was, I was doing something wrong! And yes, over the years I have sought help from different angles with this challenge, because at times I felt like I was loosing it. Nothing seemed to help.
I now know that in a way I was doing something wrong.
I was putting a meaning to all that I was thinking and feeling in regards to him. Not only was I doing that, I was judging myself. And harshly so!
Today I felt a shift. Me putting a meaning to my thoughts and feelings and then judging them was causing me to suffer. I realized that if I allow myself to think, dream, fantasize, long and feel whatever I feel, I am actually free. No judgement and no action required. Just let it be. It is what it is.
For now, I free myself from the need to understand, put a meaning to and judge myself for something that actually just is. No longer will I try to push the thoughts or feelings away or justify them or even fight with them. From now on whenever they arise, I will greet them as a dear old friend, welcome them and allow them to flow through me.
It is what it is. And that is freeing. I feel Blessed to know I can experience all these wonderful feelings, because that to me is what this human experience is about. EXPERIENCING. So to know that I can love and be loved. That in and on itself is the most precious and priceless gift.
I AM FREE
