Hey everyone.
I've been battling a depression episode for the past year, currently in my sixth month in therapy - working on fixing emotional suppression, figuring out my values/goals and dealing with my social anxiety.
One main thing which helped my breakthrough regarding suppressing my emotions was learning to sit with uncomfortable emotions rather than trying to control or fix them. I realized that my tendency to intellectualize or analyze my emotions caused me to confuse what I feel and what I think.
By guidance from my therapist, meditation, some yoga and a more mindful mindset - I managed to get to a point where my emotions (both good and bad) are "channelled" in ways that are much less distressing, and even when they do overwhelm me, the overwhelm tends to subside faster than before.
While I still have thoughts about the emotions, I usually just tag them as thoughts and try to not mind them as much - At least when meditating or experiencing a relatively intense emotion.
Thing is, according to Dr. K and some general info online on processing emotions, emotions often times have a reasoning behind them - and that while we can't control the emotions we experience we can control/observe the experiences that give us those emotions, and by that observation we can begin to improve our life.
I however have a dissonance regarding that idea. How can I practice experiencing the "raw" side of emotions (how they feel physically, what emotions I block out/suppress, often times practicing radical acceptance just to let myself certain emotion which I thought were forbidden for me to feel, etc.), and at the same time try to find some kind of guidance from that experience without spiraling back to rumination and intellectualizing.
I remember Dr. K mentioned that it's best to feel the emotion through fully, and after that make any decisions regarding the situation in which that emotion has been relevant. I find that hard to do, because often even the "thinking back" to an emotionally charged moment that I would like to understand brings these emotions back intensely enough that they impair my judgment and lead back to analyzing spirals.
It may be that I still need to work on developing this mindfulness before I can consider deeper diving into what my emotions are trying to tell me, but then I also wonder if I can prepare the ground mentally in regards to getting insight through my emotions and not just experiencing them.
What do you guys think? Has anyone had experience with something like this and has any insight? Any literature or even Dr. Ks videos that you think would be relevant would be appreciated.