So often when I’m looking for change the advice is “change your thoughts, and your feelings will follow.”​

Now, I’m not knocking that advice. I think it works really well for many people, in many situations. It even works for me in a LOT of cases.​

When does it work for me? Usually when I’m feeling neutral. Then, thinking positive thoughts, writing down my vision for where I want to be, or making up crazy positive affirmations and speaking them out loud while I’m driving alone… work so well! They put me in an amazing mood, and increase my productivity.​

But I’m not talking about those times.​

I’m talking about the times when I’m feeling down, when something is really bothering me – when I’ve been hurt, or am struggling with any other emotion deep inside of me.​

For me – and this is just my personal experience – but for me, when I’m dealing with intense emotions, trying to think my way out of them doesn’t work.​

​In fact it makes it worse, because now I’m feeling terrible and I’m also worrying and overanalyzing why the “good thoughts” aren’t helping.​

And I feel guilty for feeling so bad, now that I’m so aware of everything I’m supposed to be feeling positive about!​

If you’ve ever been stuck in your head like this you know it’s not a fun place to be.​

Again, not everyone is like this. For lots of people, working from the thoughts –> emotions is what does the trick.

But after many years of wondering what was wrong with me that all the usual advice didn’t work, I realized that all I needed was to do it that other way round:​

Emotions –> thoughts.​

There are deep and powerful methods out there that work from this perspective, where you learn how to safely access and experience the emotions that are lodged inside of you, and let them go.​

You can learn how to do this as a daily check-in with yourself, or whenever something triggering comes up for you. ​

And once you get good at letting it go, you free up all this space that lighter emotions and thoughts can now fill.​

No more pushing or imposing the positive thoughts that you’re just not feeling. It just happens naturally.