The Realism Excuse

Yesterday was election day here in Alberta. Nothing seems to bring out the range of optimism, pessimism, and realism like a good election. The social media response to the results of the election drew up so many different feelings in me (and obviously those around me) that I knew I had to explore this topic in more detail. Whereas the actual results of the election are not so much an issue to me here, the reactions of the people are.

Already, I have watched people celebrate, I have watched people pout, but nothing affected me like the "come back to reality" speeches. First, I'd like to point out that the realism is mainly directed at the optimistic celebrations, not at the pessimistic grumbles. Few realists are taking the time to assure the pessimists that the world is not as grim as it may seem, that democratic governments are temporary and that their lives are not over because a new group of people with a few different ideas now run the province. No, realism is mainly directed at the optimists, pointing out that we should not celebrate so soon since governments, especially ones elected with such high expectations and as a clear protest to the former government, do not tend to last more than one term in our current social and economic climate. Phew... Now that I got that off my chest, what is realism anyway?

Realism is the idea that we must approach the world from an objective point of view, taking a situation as it "really" is, using carefully gathered and "provable" evidence to influence our decisions and our actions. Some describe realism as the middle ground between optimism and pessimism, but I tend to disagree with that. I have seen optimistic realists and I have seen pessimistic realists. Optimism and pessimism aren't so much about ignoring reality in favour of either a positive or negative viewpoint, but about explanatory style, meaning how you explain the things that happen in your world. Put very simply, if you have something you believe to be negative happen in your life, you can decide that it's all your fault and things will always be the same (pessimism), or you can choose to believe that you did the best you could and will have better outcomes in the future (optimism). The amount of realism involved in either the perceived negative event or the explanation is often independent of whether you are being optimistic or pessimistic.

I have a couple of problems with realism. First, at a higher philosophical level, it is impossible to truly perceive reality. We all experience life through our own senses, beliefs, perceptions, and filters. The study of eyewitness memory gives a fascinating glimpse into how what we perceive and what "really" happened have so little in common as to be laughable. To proclaim that one knows what is "real," simply because we belong in the camp of the majority of believers, or perhaps in the camp of the most scientific of believers, is unwise at best. But this is really the least of my objections to realism.

Some might say that by objecting to realism, I am saying it's okay to pretend that something isn't happening. Quite the opposite actually; in my experience, I find that realism is often used as an excuse to deny what is really happening within oneself. Realism is a way to use the outside world to dismiss the inside world. Our internal experience, in particular our feelings, are just as real as the events that happen out in the "real" world. Often, when we are telling ourselves (or others) to be realistic, we are saying that we should dismiss any feelings we may be experiencing in favour of caution and reason. As a recovering realist, I understand that this is often all done in order to avoid pain. If you dare to hope, celebrate, and rejoice at your current circumstances, you open yourself up to possible disappointment when outer circumstances change again. And if you dare to be angry and disappointed with your current circumstances, you are opening yourself up to the pain you already have within you. If you take a "realistic" approach, you are closing your heart down to your current reality in order to prevent a future let-down, or perhaps to dull the pain of a current one.

So if you are angry, sad, or disappointed - feel it! And if you are happy, elated, or hopeful - feel it! Don't use a realistic argument to deny what it is you feel now. There will be time enough to deal with what happens in the future, there in the future. Now, I'm going to go celebrate with a piece of cake!

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© Amelie Rossignol and Heart Answers, 2015. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Amelie Rossignol and Heart Answers with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Expressing Your Feelings

Expressing your feelings is a funny thing. There seems to be such a thin line between appropriately expressing your needs and desires, and just pouring emotional pain onto others. As I've said before, it is vitally important to honour our feelings as valid, but that doesn't give us permission to use them as a weapon on others. So what does it look like when you are expressing your feelings in a healthy way?

I hate to admit it, but I was mad at my husband... yup, MAD! There's no reason to lay out all the details but basically, I needed some time to myself and he was working lots of extra hours. On Friday, I thought he would come home, he would be able to BBQ for us and we could have some nice down-time before a busy weekend. Late in the afternoon, the dreaded text message came to me saying he was staying late at the office yet again. Bang: let loose the anger and frustration, and all the nasty thoughts that came with it. I tried to text him back, but the old adage "if you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all" came to mind and I held off. If I had tried to communicate my feelings to him at that time, my pain would have been speaking, not me. Even the nicest words would have come off as snarky and passive-aggressive, if not in word, then in energy. And believe me, people can sense the energy behind your words, some of us more than others.

Again, I could have talked myself out of my feelings. My husband did not mean to make me angry; he was just doing the best he could with his time and knowledge. I know that he was not trying to make me miserable. This is important information for me to realize, but it doesn't mean I should ignore my feelings. So what's a girl to do? Well, I had to take some time to acknowledge my feelings, and love the parts of me that were feeling them. I brought up each set of thoughts and feelings one at a time, let them flow (tears and all), and then said "I love you" to myself as kindly and lovingly as possible. I was being there for me. After a few minutes, I was able to calm down significantly. For the next little while, now and then, another feeling would come back, and I just repeated the process.

After taking this time with myself and my thoughts and feelings, I was ready to decide what to communicate to my husband. I waited until he came home, and I let him know what I had been hoping for and how I was disappointed. It wasn't perfect communication but I got my point across without hurting his feelings or beginning an argument. If I had dismissed my feelings, I might not have said anything to my husband at all, and then those feelings might have come back even stronger the next time something didn't go my way.

In my case, my unhealthy communication patterns tend to be passive or passive-aggressive, but I think the same process goes for those aggressive communicators out there. The tricky part might be catching yourself before you go off on someone. And if you miss the boat at first, it's not too late to say your "I love you's" to yourself after the argument is over and you are able to take time on your own. And even if your communication partner is not so loving and understanding as mine (I love you sweetie!), your self-love efforts can still make a positive impact on your communication and your relationship.

How do you express your feelings? Do you let your pain do your communicating for you? Let me know what you think!

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© Amelie Rossignol and Heart Answers, 2015. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Amelie Rossignol and Heart Answers with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Emotional Themes

An emotional theme describes a particular emotion that seems to be occurring in many different areas of your life. Occasionally it can be something obvious like when you're outwardly angry about everything that's happening in your life, but sometimes it's quite a bit more subtle.

I can give you the example of what's happening to me right now. It seems that in so many different areas, I'm feeling helpless. Financially, my husband brings in all the money right now. I can change a few things about what we spend and how much money is going out of the household, but overall, I feel a little financially helpless. Also, my daughter's alternative school program has suffered from low enrolment in the past two years and the school board is considering shutting down the program. My husband and I have spent time, money and effort to recruit new families to the program but the school board's decision deadline is approaching and I feel helpless. And all at the same time, my husband is really busy right now, having many projects on the go that I can't help him with at all. On top of that, I haven't been feeling well today so I asked for more of his time to take care of the kids after school. He is stressed and busy, and I feel helpless. And these are just a few of the areas in my life where I can identify feeling helpless right now.

So you see, helplessness is an emotional theme in my life right now. Now each of these individual situations I can spiritually intellectualize away. I can trust that God has always provided me with the means to take care of my family before and that I have ample evidence of a secure financial future, so I can stop worrying and have faith that I have the strength to survive whatever happens financially. I know that even if my daughter's program is cut, we will find another option and I will learn valuable lessons from our search for her best option - so of course, I should let go and let God. I know that my husband has his own lessons to learn regarding feeling stressed and busy, so I should let him walk his own path, and do my best to be helpful where I can. None of these things are untrue, but they all have something in common. They are spiritual "truths" that I may be using to ignore or dismiss the fact that I feel helpless.

Now, I know that emotional themes are an important topic right now. How do I know? Well, despite having many lovely ideas for blog posts this month, this is the first topic that has sent me running to my computer, even though I have a splitting headache and a date with my pillow the minute my husband gets home. These emotional themes, even though they exist throughout our lives, can be easily missed because they involve feelings we are avoiding in some way. If you're feeling like nothing is changing in your life, no matter what kind of effort you put in, a hidden emotional theme may be involved. So how do you find the sneaky themes? You can do what I did - I asked my self: "What is the last thing I want to be feeling right now?" Then you can ask yourself where you are feeling that feeling anyway. If you find yourself naming multiple areas of your life where you have that same feeling, you have an emotional theme.

Now I know that I'm feeling helpless, and that it's something I've been avoiding. What good does that do me? Once again, the idea is not to dismiss the feeling, even if you can give yourself a thousand reasons why it isn't true. If the feeling is there, the thoughts that created it may or may not be true, but the feeling itself is true. You have named it, now feel it, accept it, love it as it is, and love the part of yourself that has this feeling. Once you are able to integrate that part back into yourself, the feeling no longer needs to permeate your life in order to get your attention.

What emotional theme can you find in your life? Are you willing to love those parts of you that feel angry, helpless, lazy, ungrateful, bored, useless, sad, or afraid? Once you are, you can restore yourself to wholeness that can change your life.

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© Amelie Rossignol and Heart Answers, 2015. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Amelie Rossignol and Heart Answers with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Comfort Confusion

I am the Queen of Comfort. I have always been physically sensitive so it's been important to me to choose clothes and furniture that keep me feeling comfortable. If I'm not physically comfortable, I find it difficult to concentrate. I've also been prone to worrying so I create lists and plans to keep me mentally comfortable. Then there's the whole emotional comfort zone - I like to avoid any situations that make me feel stressed, angry, or too fearful. I don't think I'm alone either. We have a whole culture devoted to prizing comfort in its many forms and we painstakingly arrange our lives around our comforts. But why is comfort so important to us and what does it really do for us?

In a way, comfort is a measure of your judgement. What you are comfortable with is what you have judged to be okay in your life, and what you are uncomfortable with is what you have judged to be inappropriate to your life. Note that this isn't the same as what is wanted or unwanted in your life. You can want to have joy, but be uncomfortable with feeling joy because of judgement of that joy; that judgement can be based on any number of events (or lack thereof) in your experience. Comfort is saying "I'm okay with this," so we look to repeat the experiences that we have judged to be acceptable and familiar in our lives. Going outside of our comfort zone means not knowing or not liking whatever feelings (whether physical, mental, or emotional) we will experience.

Matt Kahn (TrueDivineNature.com) said that one of the most damaging beliefs people have is that comfort creates harmony. I see that as people looking for a form of eternity in a temporary sense of comfort. I think that if I can feel comfortable all of the time, then I no longer have anything to worry about. We struggle so desperately to fill eternity with comforts that are by their very nature transient. At a certain level, we recognize these comforts to be temporary, so we try to fill our lives with quantity of comfort; more chocolate cake, more shopping, more TV time, more relationships, more vacations, more parties, more alone time, and so on and so on. We resent anything that removes us from our comforts and fear never being able to get enough, and that is a valid fear because when you are searching for eternity in a temporary experience, you're bound to be disappointed eventually.

I'm not saying that we are wrong to search for comfort in our temporary world. It is a necessary part of our journey to experiment with finding comfort outside of ourselves, just as it is necessary to fail in such a search. Every disappointment is a call to show you that what you are doing isn't working. How long will it take for you to see the proof the world is giving you that the eternity and harmony you are looking for is not in your particular choice of comforts? The harmony and eternity are what can be found inside yourself. When you find your true nature and become familiar with the amazing love that you are, you find harmony, and that in turn creates comfort in your life, no matter what the situation.

If I have been the Queen of Comfort, I guess it's because I needed a lot of evidence that comfort isn't what I'm looking for, and I wanted that evidence fast. I don't think I'm quite ready to drop the title yet but I've been discovering more and more experiences of my own harmony creating comfort where I found none before. So, I say "All Hail the Queen of Comfort!" Nothing less than that will bring me back to my own harmony.

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© Amelie Rossignol and Heart Answers, 2015. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Amelie Rossignol and Heart Answers with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Feelings 101 - The Language of the Heart

It is amazing to me how little we are taught about our feelings. As a child, I spent hours figuring out how to add two numbers together and practising the skill repeatedly. But if you ask me what a feeling is, I have to draw on my experience with holistic health and spiritual teachings, most of which I gained as an adult. Feelings are so integral to our everyday life, I think it makes sense to learn as much about them as we can.

I guess we don't learn about feelings because there aren't easily explainable and there are so many different theories about them. Quite frankly, people can't even seem to agree upon a definition for feeling nor how it differs from an emotion. There are different linguistic, neurological, psychological and spiritual definitions. Since, I'm going to talk about feelings, I'm going to have to give a definition, and it's going to be my own. I've seen similar definitions to my own elsewhere but I can give no scientific evidence for my definition - it's just one that works for me.

Physical feelings are your brain and body giving you information about the world around you. Emotional feelings are also information about the world around you, but instead of giving you the perspective of your body, your basic emotional feelings give you the perspective of your heart. In other words, your feelings are the language of your heart. Remember that none of the feelings are bad or good in of themselves. Each type of feeling, when treated respectfully, creates a different type of heart-based reaction. For example, fear keeps us safe, anger creates motivation, and grief allows us to let go. Now before you start telling me that your feelings are not giving you accurate guidance, let me explain one more piece of the puzzle.

I used to be really confused about feelings. How can I trust my feelings when I know that they can get me into trouble? How do I know my fear is reasonable, when I can be afraid of something as simple as picking up the phone and calling someone? How can I make a choice based on my joy and excitement when I have been excited about things that have eventually created such pain for me? It took a lot of introspection for me to come up with an answer. It seems that your feelings can only give you accurate guidance when your mind is focused on the present. So often though, we observe something clouded with our past experiences, or we make up a future story about what something will mean. I'm afraid to make a phone call, not because it is dangerous to me but because past phone calls have been painful to me. And the joy I have felt about a choice was not a reality of the choice itself, but an indication of how I feel about everything I imagined that choice would lead to.

Some teachers give the name emotion to these feelings mixed with thoughts. But whatever you want to call it, most of the feelings the average person has are based on some sort of past or future bias. It's no wonder we don't trust our feelings! I imagine that once a person has the ability to truly live in the present, that person can fully rely on their heart to guide their lives. So what does that mean for the rest of us in the meantime? When you want to know how you feel about something, be aware of how much past or future bias you have about it, and focus on the present reality of the thing. And if all else fails, we fortunately have another indicator that can be helpful. This is where the gut feeling comes in. Your gut can give you a quick yes or no feeling on whether the object of your attention is in service to your heart or not.

It takes time to learn to listen to your heart. Both your feelings and gut instinct have a wonderful role to play in helping you towards that goal, as long as you understand what they are and how to use them.

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© Amelie Rossignol and Heart Answers, 2015. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Amelie Rossignol and Heart Answers with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

A Useful Engine

If you have ever seen the children's show Thomas and Friends, you may have noticed how obsessed each of those vehicles are about being a "useful engine." It seems ridiculous how much time and effort the engines spend in the pursuit of "usefulness," and yet it is something I see playing out just as intensely in the world around me. For example, when we meet someone new, one of the first questions we ask is: "What do you do?" It's as if we think we can get a good sense of who someone is by knowing what he or she does. Once we know someone's occupation we instantly decide how useful we believe that particular "doing" to be.

Like many others out there, I have trouble feeling useful. I'm not a particularly high-energy person, so I tend to take it easy. I don't fill my days with too many activities, and when I am working I take a lot of breaks. I'm a stay-at-home mom, and while most people will be politically correct and say that I work as hard as anyone else, I still get a sense of being "less" than someone with a "real" career.

Why are we, as a society, so obsessed with usefulness? Beyond the historical and sociological reasons, I think we have created this hook between self-worth and usefulness. If I contribute to society in measurable and tangible ways, then I know I am good enough to be on the planet and consume the physical resources that I do. I have this constant need to prove that I deserve to be here.

And yet, those times when I do feel useful, my self-worth is not really any more enhanced. Any peace I get for having accomplished a large to-do list is often quickly followed by thoughts of what more I could have done or of the recovery time I might need to "waste" the next day. I will even criticize the quality of my usefulness, thinking that while I did manage to clean the bathrooms, I didn't save a life or make a dollar to feed my family. On the one hand, I am so convinced that I my worth is increased by doing, and on the other hand, no amount of doing is ever enough to increase my self-worth.

Before you start telling me that I am worth being here simply by the fact that I exist, let me tell you that I know that. I have been studying spirituality for years and, mentally, I know that I am worth something and I have something to offer to the people of this planet. I understand that every cog is needed for the clock to run, that God makes no mistakes so I am no mistake, and that like the moon, I make waves just by being me. No matter what the explanation or the metaphor, I know it, but I do not feel it (at least, not yet).

When I look to my future, I want to be able to teach and heal others, and I know that I don't want to need to fill my schedule wall-to-wall with clients to feel like I've been useful. I feel that it's time to accept myself no matter how much I appear to get done, to stop trying to change myself into worthiness, and to stop doing things for no other reason than to feel more useful. So, I'm sending love to the piece of me that needs to feel useful, and I'm sending love and compassion to my laziest parts. I am giving myself full permission to stop trying so hard to be useful and to start being worthy as I am.

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© Amelie Rossignol and Heart Answers, 2015. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Amelie Rossignol and Heart Answers with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Following the Rules

I'm really good at following the rules. And goodness knows that people are fond of coming up with rules; we have everything from multiple levels of government laws, to basic social rules, rules for every type of game, sport or gathering, and even our own personal unspoken rules. Rules give us a sense of safety and control over our environment and our relationships. We even categorize people by their reactions and relationships with rules: criminals, rebels, goody two-shoes', and, of course, lawyers. Can we really even hope to follow all the rules we come across?

Everyone, based on their personality, their up-bringing, and their experiences chooses which rules they will follow and which they won't. Some might argue that government laws are the most important to follow, but I think that social rules are where people are under the most pressure to conform (laws and social rules often match-up, but not always). Of course, social rules are not uniform, but vary across age, gender, family, culture, race and social setting, just to name a few. But enough dry social studies - what happens when your spirit, your intuition, your life tells you to break the rules?

Now, if you choose to consciously follow a spiritual path, I'm pretty certain this is going to happen to you, if it hasn't already. At some point, you may be called to break a social rule or ten. Oh, and please don't get me wrong here, if you're getting the feeling you should rob a bank or abandon your children, chances are it's not your spirit that you're talking to. But if you're getting the call to parent differently than the rest your family, to change your diet or clothes in a way that might make you stand out from your friends, or to start to be openly honest about what (or who) you love even though it makes others uncomfortable, it's a feeling you should really pay attention to.

You see, part of the whole reason for being on Earth at all is to discover yourself: what you like, what you're good at, what you love, what is easy for you, and equally, what you don't like and what's a challenge for you. Now as nice as it would be, if you grew up surrounded with people who think and feel exactly the way you do (which is really impossible anyway), how would you really discover who you are? In that sort of case, there would be no real discovery, no drive for you to embrace and cherish who you are as an individual. So you see, you're very likely meant to find yourself in at least one situation in your life where you need to be different from those around you.

As I said before, I'm good at following the rules. I did that really well for a long time. I studied engineering in university for over four years and I was a computer programmer for six more years. And then I heard the call to be different - to be me. Seemingly out-of-nowhere, I quit my job and the entire social world that came with it in order to study holistic health and shortly thereafter become a stay-at-home mother. These decisions were not logical and sensible as engineers are supposed to be, nor did they fit my image of an intelligent and modern career woman. It was a hard decision but the pain of not following my heart had finally exceeded the pain of not following the social rules I was exposed to.

Anyone I've talked to who has made this kind of change in their life describe some things in common. The decision to break the rules and be true to themselves was difficult or even agonizing, but once the change was made, they never regretted the decision. When you are following the rules, who are you being true to? Are they your rules or something you picked up from those around you? You don't have to wait until the pain of not being you catches up with you. You are being given every opportunity to be yourself - when will you choose to accept?

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© Amelie Rossignol and Heart Answers, 2014. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Amelie Rossignol and Heart Answers with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.