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Let's Talk About Skills: Emotional Release Techniques

Writer's picture: Ren Ren

Updated: Jun 13, 2024


As a spiritual counselor I see people struggle with what to do with their hurt. A lot of times the first instinct is to place blame for the hurt on themselves or on another. I identify with this perspective and am recently having the awareness that I have not forgiven myself for some of my past mistakes. As a result, I am less able to forgive others when I feel hurt, even with simple things such as a small comment that stung or another form of my perceived rejection.


It is important that you look inside in order to see what your hurt is about. Where do you feel hurt? Does it have a shape, a color, a scent, a mood? Does your pain recall a past moment from recent history or childhood? Where in your body is your pain stored? Can you connect to that part of you and ask what it needs?


My pain has been steadily hanging on in my heart like a fog that is clinging to the top of a river. The river flows and has lots of movement, but right above it, the smoggy air refuses to move and just sits, waiting to be noticed.


So I sit in silence and do some deep breathing. Sometimes I play some music, something meditative or healing. I really like to play the Solfeggio frequencies from YouTube and I like to see what healing frequency feels right to me in the moment. Then I tune in with my breath and I look inside my heart. I notice my pain and I ask it questions. My responses are about abandonment, fear of failure, fear of losing loved ones or of not being worthy. I decide to attend to my pain, to listen to it. I tell my pain that I accept that it is there, that I do not intend to run away or try to escape it. Maybe if I feel able, I can send it love. I envision a white or a pink light around my heart and then I ask what I can give my pain that might feel healing. The next step is to take action and practice emotional release.


Emotional release techniques are important for us to practice so that the pain (or the smog) in our hearts doesn’t sit and fester.


Some of my favorite Emotional Release Techniques:


  1. Journaling to figure out what emotions you are feeling and if possible, where they came from. If you are unsure about the differences in the experience of various emotions, look up an emotions chart or read a book that explains emotion such as the one Dr Marc Brackett created. His book “Permission to Feel” could also be a good resource for you.

  2. Dancing to release any stuck energy and to increase joy and self expression. Put on your favorite song and shake your body however it feels best.

  3. Crying without shame. Get comfy and with big box of Kleenex, music, a candle, draw a salt bath with essential oil, whatever helps you to feel as if it is not only okay to cry, but it is helpful. Crying is a way in which your body can purify itself from pain and it can be a more enjoyable experience that we are used to having.

  4. Playing Solfeggio frequencies, singing bowls, or other healing and meditative music. Any music that is created in love will be helpful for emotional release. There are many forms of healing music and I tend to trust what my intuition says when I begin to listen to various artists. Try it for yourself and see what resonates.

  5. Meditation or meditative actions. Anything where you can do a repetitive motion can count as meditative, such as walking, doing chores or something like knitting. Meditation is simply about allowing everything in your experience to come into your awareness. Then you can make the choice, do I let that thought go? Do I attend to that emotion? Meditation can be prayer or it can be listening to yourself or to the Universe. It is enjoyable to allow yourself to just “be” for 5 minutes. No expectations. Just sit and be. Try it and see what happens.

  6. Massage with craniosacral therapy or other somatic therapies. I love my massage therapist and I love her skills. She definitely helps me to get unstuck by utilizing pressure points in my body. Similarly, you can use an acupressure mat or a foam roll to figure out how to assist yourself in releasing. There are many therapists, books and videos who can help with somatic (relating to the body) practices. One of my favorites is simply to shake my body, just shake, shake, shake everything out. It feels great.

  7. Therapy to get more definitive emotional intelligence and emotional release skills. It helps to have a guide and a structured routine around feeling things when you are not necessarily used to doing so.

  8. Exercise if you do something that feels good to you. If you do not like to run, running for emotional release might not be the experience you want to have. But perhaps you are interested in kick boxing or feeling the pressure of weights and using that sensation to release something. I tend to like interval training where I do not have to repeat moves and can work through my whole body so I feel rejuvenated.

  9. Energy work. There are too many types of energy work to list, but a few include Reiki and crystal healing, breathwork, yoga, chanting, acupuncture, ecstatic dance, and qi gong. Active breathing is especially effective, I have found. I like to use Shamanic Breathing, Breath of Fire, Alkaline Breathing and the Wim Hof Method. A Google search will get you there. I practice Reiki, (Reiki is a Japanese form of noninvasive healing that uses intention, Universal love and relaxation techniques.) After working with Reiki healers I decided to study it I liked it so much. If you are interested in learning about Reiki, please let me know. I am teaching and find it to be full of joy and magic. There are also a lot of great YouTube videos on Qi Gong practices and they are excellent for self healing and moving energy out of the body.

It’s okay to feel whatever you are feeling. You can find ways to process your feelings and then you can let them go. If you need help, that's okay, too. Ask. We all need help sometimes.






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