Clear the mind. Clear the emotions. Emotional freedom is the key to a successful existence.

The goal is to function in a frictionless space. We use expressions like “Bring yourself together!”

This “being together” means absence of inner resistance.

Emotions like guilt, shame, anger, fear, doubts or sadness have all a “negative” connotation.

The truth is that all these emotions have two sides to them: a positive one and a negative one.

Take anger for instance. Anger can be a very freeing force. Getting angry is sometimes liberating because it clears your space and sends out a powerful statement. Getting angry is like saying: “You are not respecting my boundaries. Right now, I need you to get my message and this is the only way for me to get it through!”

So anger is powerful and very useful in some situations. Someone who does not have the resource to get angry could miss an essential life skill here.

Another example: fear. In its original state, fear is a protective force. Fear is a learned emotional response to an external stimulus. Suppose I burn myself on a flame. Aouchhhh! It hurts! I associate fire with the feeling of pain. Next time, I keep distance from a flame because I want to avoid pain. “Fear of fire” is just the way my mind protects me from being burned.

Fear of heights? Same story. Without fear of heights, we might put our life in extreme danger and fall from a cliff.

Guilt? It is an emotional response generated by our own conscience or our environment. What our guilt says could be something like: “This time, you went too far. Someone got hurt. I want you to learn from this experience. There is a limit here you must not cross in the future.”

• How much is too much?

This is the true question! What makes such emotions “negative” is their over influence. Fear can be a spiral we can’t stop. A negative experience could start a chain reaction of negative emotions which can sabotage our existence.

The real trick of emotional freedom is to get rid of what is useless. It is to clear the mind from old fears, guilt, doubts, angers which are no longer needed.

The experience which generated the negative emotion might be old. Nevertheless, the emotional imprint itself can stay around much longer than needed. At the end a human being can walk around with piles of undigested negative feelings like this invisible guilt about something which happened 10 years ago and has not yet been cleared.

• Clearing, Dissolution

Take the example of guilt:

What is this “digestion thing”? It is forgiveness, acceptance, learning from the experience, etc.

Here is a key thought: “I did my best! I am not perfect! I did learn a lot from that and next time I’m sure I will do better. I apologize if I did hurt anyone in the process.”

And then what? Move on! Once you integrate the experience, move on. The future, not the past will allow you to correct your action.

Learn what you have to learn and get rid of the remaining emotional imprint (there are other ways than heading for the nearest pub…).

• Effectiveness

Our effectiveness in life depends immensely on our ability to clear our emotional space.  

With a bit of practice, this becomes as natural as drinking water.

Coaching provides powerful approaches which can greatly help you with that...

What happens in a coaching session