Looking at the difficult experiences that emerge at the end of the year

So it's Christmas, and what did you do?

Play aside, just to quote that famous song of that time, as we approached the end of the year we started reflecting on the past year. This process is very particular and it may be that you experience a mixture of different emotions, joy for valuable experiences, sadness for the losses you have or for goals that were not achieved and so on.

How do you deal with these experiences? Do you open yourself to them, accept your presence, seek to understand what these emotions are communicating to you? Or do you dodge, try to suppress or eliminate them?

If you notice yourself running away from these experiences, it is understandable. It is uncomfortable looking at this, as it is often experiences that put us in contact with uncomfortable emotions, difficult thoughts and uncomfortable body sensations. So why do that? I will bring a point of view on the subject:

Our emotions communicate to us valuable information, this is even one of their adaptive functions necessary for our survival. If a person is afraid, this fear communicates that there is a threat situation. From this communication, our emotions direct us to an action to meet the present need. In the case of fear, it drives us to fight or escape to face the threat, for example.

Now returning to the holiday reflections, what is the emotion that arises is communicating to you? Are you willing to listen, even if it is uncomfortable looking at it? What does this emotion need? Can you meet this need?

You may have read here and still find this idea a little abstract. I will try to clarify more by bringing an example of mine: this year I reflected a lot about my professional self, my values as therapist and how I want to practice my work. This self -reflection was difficult, because I noticed that I was far from a theoretical approach that makes a lot of sense to me, made me experience confusion and sadness for spending so much time away from it. And by allowing me to look at it, I could feel these emotions, suffer because I would not be where I would like, while I could validate my journey and understand that I needed to live all this to get where I am, because that's how things happened. From this, I was also able to reconnect with this important approach to me and sign up for a course that brings me closer to this practice.

I was able to make all this movement because I allowed myself to look at this discomfort and find out what I needed to explore my experience. Is that you? What do you need? Are you willing to look at this?