Connie P. Milligan, LCSW
Table of Contents
“The hardest part is allowing yourself to experience the pain and clearly understand it.”
Emotional pain is a common experience, yet how you respond to it is what separates those who move ahead with their life and those who don’t. As a therapist and life coach, I have seen a wide range of responses to emotional pain and love supporting people who are willing to use it as a catalyst for often stunning and dramatic transformation in their lives.
At some point, strong emotional reactions will surface in response to situations you find yourself in. Notice your anxiety, fear, frustration, anger, hurt, and depression. You may find It in a work setting that involves conflict with co-workers or the values underlying a project you are doing. It may surface in personal relationships with loved ones and friends that make you realize something is very wrong. It may be anxiety over taking the next big step or depression because you feel stuck. It’s important to notice these reactions, they tell you something significant.
How you respond to the signals that your emotional pain is giving you makes the difference between those who get plowed under by the emotion and those who move ahead.
Let me share 6 steps you can take to lift yourself from pain to transformation. You will see that your emotional pain can be a gift to initiate change.
Stay With The Pain Long Enough To Understand It
The hardest part is allowing yourself to experience the pain and clearly understand it. I don’t say this lightly. Our limbic system is designed to fight, flee or freeze when exposed to trauma or situations that produce strong emotional reactions and many people get stuck in these responses with repeated exposure for decades, without recognizing what is happening.
Turn inward and ask yourself where your pain is coming from. Your body is telling you something important – you are reacting to something that is incorrect for you. Get honest and clear with yourself about what it is and understand the why of your own reactions. Ask yourself, what is really wrong in the situation?
Recognize The Pattern and Life Lesson Involved
Often people repeat patterns of emotional reactivity and dysfunction that are multi-generational. Like mother, like daughter can perpetuate bad relationships, similar traumas, lack of confidence, and poor choices that have negative outcomes.
Step back and look at what may be a pattern in your life and might be one that has gone on for many generations. This becomes a life lesson that you need to learn. Are you ready to recognize it?
Common patterns of life lessons that many people face are things like feeling lonely vs. loved, fear vs. confidence, depression vs. joy, struggle vs. flow, poor vs. abundant, resentment vs. acceptance, and anger vs. calm. Notice what yours are and recognize that this is something you can change. The sooner you recognize your life lesson, and do something to correct it, the sooner you will release the pain and embrace the life you want. Get excited about that possibility!
Notice What You Long For
Everything exists on a polarity between positive and negative. Notice what is on the opposite end of the negative emotional pain you have. If you feel criticized and beaten down, don’t you long for acceptance and appreciation? If you are anxious and afraid of the next steps, don’t you long for confidence and support?
The negative feelings help you define and clarify what you actually want and need. Many people try to change their feelings, or the situation causing it and have trouble moving out of it. This can go on for years. I know, having done this myself in work settings and in love. Facing yourself and knowing you have done all you can do and it’s time to move on is essential. It is what changed my life dramatically for the better. It will work for you too!
Focus On The Better Vision For Yourself
Once you have a clear idea of what you are seeking, you can begin creating a vision of the better feelings and situations that you seek. The more detail you have about the positive vision for yourself the better; you are creating a template for the changes you make. When it is something you genuinely want, you will easily fill yourself with the positive feelings that you anticipate experiencing.
Those positive anticipatory feelings are the fuel that makes the Law of Attraction work. Understand, that when you are an emotional and energetic reflection of what you seek, you will be able to find it easily. When doubt and conflicting thoughts hamper your vision for yourself, you are negating it as an option. Stay clear and focused on what you desire with positive anticipation, and you will be on the path to change.
Find Support
To make any big or small change happen, it helps to have support. Because you are stepping out of a negatively charged emotional situation, you need to have people around you who believe in the better vision you have for yourself. It is not uncommon to look around and realize that there are a lot of people immersed in negativity just like you.
Consider who will support the new vision for yourself and recognize when you need to move out of your current friendship patterns to find them. Finding guidance from a therapist or coach is always a good idea – an outside professional perspective helps you to see yourself more clearly and more positively.
Move Toward The Solution
With a clear vision and support, you will be able to move toward the solution you seek. Consider all the things involved and break it into small steps that are not so overwhelming. The new job, business, relationship change, move, education, training, or lifestyle revamp you want will start to come to you.
Remember the negative emotions that start the change process are your signal that something is very wrong. View them as a gift from inside that is prompting you to claim your better self, your greater good. Your emotional pain is the catalyst for transformation and taking these 6 steps means happiness is right around the corner.
About Connie
Connie is a therapy and transformational life coach.
After a long career in mental health as a therapist and Executive Corporate Director, she began seeking change. She wanted her inner and outer life to be a authentic reflection of her values and beliefs. Connie wanted her professional and personal life to be more soul satisfying. This launched years of study and exploration of new treatment modalities along with personal and spiritual soul searching.
