Are you battling anxiety or depression? Does waking up each day feel like a struggle? If so, you could be having undigested emotions weighing you down. Huh? See, trauma, abuse, or a sudden illness can make us have unpleasant emotions leading to soul loss. Unless you start your healing process, these emotions remain hidden in your subconscious, causing havoc to your life for years to come. Indeed, we can never wish away our unpleasant feelings. But we can deal with them through the art of deep listening.

What Is Deep Listening?

Deep listening is a form of mindful meditation whereby you become fully present to your inner self or those around you. Simply put, it is a spiritual practice of listening to connect. Here, you engage in quiet moments that help you awaken your buried emotions.

Similarly, you nurture a connection with anyone talking to you at that moment, sharing your goals, dreams, fears, and concerns. Hence, it entails listening to yourself or others to form a connection.

Active Listening vs. Deep Listening

Active listening refers to you choosing to be fully present in a conversation. It forms the basis of deep listening because you focus on what the other person is saying as you become an active listener. Deep listeners go a step further to connect to those non-verbal communications from the other person. More so, deep listening includes listening to our emotions to connect to them.

Why Do We Need to Practice Deep Listening?

Listening with intention helps you understand your surrounding and the people closest to you. In turn, you learn how to best respond to your emotions and those of others. This understanding is necessary when undertaking your soul loss healing process. Below are more benefits of deep listening:

#1: Develop Resistance Against Surrounding Distractions

We live in a digital age where smartphones, computers, and other smart gadgets distract us all day. These technologies make it almost impossible to maintain eye contact when talking to someone else. Likewise, they eat into our self-care time, robbing us of a chance to connect to our inner feelings. Deep listening encourages us to maintain undivided attention to our inner self or those near us.

#2: Resist the Temptation to Respond Without Deep Thought

One of the barriers to effective communication is selective listening. Here, we choose what we want to hear, then formulate responses that we think are suitable. A biased listener is always quick to offer solutions without taking into account the other person’s feelings. Likewise, if we never take time to listen to our inner self, we may judge ourselves based on the stigma surrounding our conditions.

#3: Facilitates Soul Loss Healing Process

Have you been diagnosed with a mental illness? Do you feel like you are going crazy because that is what society brands you? If so, you may find yourself hiding away from friends and family, fearing being caught off guard by their out-of-control emotions.

However, did you know that a bit of deep listening practice can unearth the unresolved emotions behind mental illness? 

A person who understands the root cause of their mental conditions can practice self-care and have self-compassion for healthy living because shadow emotions are never permanent. Mindful meditation allows you to change your emotional triggers, hence, facilitate the soul loss healing process. 

Deep Listening Must Be Intentional

Now, anyone can practice deep listening at any time or place. However, did you know that not everyone can listen without bias or aiming to be a problem solver? Yes, deep listening is not easy. It takes time and practice to develop the skills.

The Techniques

Now that we have an idea of what deep listening is all about, here are some top deep listening techniques you can start practicing today:

#1: Heart-Gut Centering

Are you making a life-changing decision? Find a quiet place at home or outdoors. Set up your mat or pillows to sit comfortably. Place one hand on your stomach and the other against your chest. Concentrate on listening to your inner voice. What do you hear?

The head, heart, and gut are the centers of our decision-making. The head is our rational brain, the heart is the emotional brain, and the gut is the intuitive brain. There are lots of instances where we follow our gut feelings or heart feelings. These are the times where logical thinking using our brain may not be adequate in assessing emotions.

Listening to your heart and gut allows you to be a rational thinker who weighs your feelings and emotions. In turn, you avoid cognitive dissonance, a state of inner conflict that can lead to anxiety and depression. 

#2: Listening to the Surrounding Voices

When was the last time you were still and listened to voices all around you? It may be the whistling trees in your backyard, a shaky door, a ticking clock, or the sound of your breathing. Whatever you get to hear, allowing yourself to connect to your surrounding gets you into a mindful state. This awareness state refreshes your mind, expands your thought process, and renews your wisdom and intelligence.

#3: Journal Your Thoughts

Are you feeling lonely, depressed, or in a crisis? Put what you are feeling in writing. Conscious writing is an excellent way to practice deep listening. You use pen and paper as an avenue for your creative energy and ideas to flow. Doing so gives you mental clarity, regaining a sense of sanity when overwhelmed with emotions.

Here are some tips to get you started:

• Use a pen and paper instead of your smartphone or notebook. Journaling your thought this way is real and tangible.
• Write it as it is, immediately the thought pops in your head. Do not overthink.
• Maintain a dream journal.  Capture what you remember from your dreams, then reflect on it.
• Grammatical errors are allowed. What matters is getting your thoughts on paper.
• Read aloud what you have written. It will give you a chance to hear your thoughts and voice your unspoken pain and trauma.

Conclusion

Deep listening is necessary if you want to develop mindful thinking and grow your emotional intelligence. These two aspects ensure you stay in tune with your inner self and be more susceptible to non-verbal communications from others. That way, you live in the present, embrace your uniqueness, and cut yourself some slack, especially when undergoing a challenging emotional experience. 

Crystal Quiz

What Are Shadow Emotions?

All emotions are neutral. Yet, there are some emotions that we subconsciously categorize as bad. Consequently, we try to disassociate with them. These are the shadow emotions.

Shadow emotions are emotions that remain hidden in our shadow, behind what we portray as our self-image. Then, they manifest unexpectedly, causing havoc to what we consider as our stable lifestyles.

Understanding Emotions

Emotions are a vital part of human life. They give us essential information that reassures us when we are on the right track. Likewise, emotions help us to relate to others. They form the basis of how we handle the expectations and demands of life. Indeed, our emotions form the basis of our rapid and automatic response to most situations.  It is our way of communicating our feelings.

Why Do We Fear Emotions?

We develop emotional reactions through our past events. But what if your feelings are out of your past negative experiences? Like when you feel shameful at the thought of taking part in the school debate because the last time you did so, the crowd booed at you.

These negative encounters can turn into an enormous scary feeling, resembling a shadow of someone who hurt you in the past. It is more like the shadow emotions you want to avoid. For this reason, many people fear and avoid shadow emotions viewing them as painful.

The Effect of Shadow Emotions

If you were scared a lot while you were a child, you might grow up having a core feeling of being afraid. In turn, you may over-protect yourself so that no one could hurt you ever again. Childhood emotional wounds leave us with a deep need to feel safe. We constantly desire someone to love and connect with.

However, when we try to over-protect ourselves, we end up chasing away the people we want to attract. So, managing your shadow emotions becomes vital for leading a healthy life.

Managing Shadow Emotions

Did you know that our emotions towards a specific aspect can change over time? Here, we get the needed opportunity to manage our shadow emotions. So how do we achieve that?

#1: Understand Your Type of Shadow Emotions

Do you recognize your shadow emotions? If not, you will struggle to control feelings that you do not understand. And, we feel and function better when we are aware of and deal with our real emotions. For example, if you feel agitated by your partner’s habits but mistake them for his/her uniqueness; you may mislead his/her into a committed relationship that breaks up eventually.

Secondly, understand the types of emotions and their effect on you. For starters, basic emotions like surprise, happiness, interest, anger, fear, and shame may arouse you or calm you down, respectively.

Like when you get suspicious out of a past fear emotion, you become alert to your surroundings. In contrast, we feel content due to our past happiness emotion. Hence, we become relaxed when content.

#2: Appreciate the Purpose of Unpleasant Emotions

Unpleasant emotions like anxiety, loneliness, suspicion, and irritation help us survive. However, they become more unpleasant when we fight them. Still, if you allow them to be there, they become less unpleasant.

#3: Listen to Shadow Emotions

If you have a partner you trust, you can tell them about your fears. That way, instead of ignoring, covering up, or denying this shadow emotion, you welcome and listen to it. With time, this fear will become more manageable.

#4: Often, Shadow Emotions Can Be Misleading

Note that; people can fake emotions to get what they want. Other times, people cover up their real shadow emotions with other “acceptable” emotions. When what we express is contrary to what we feel, we can drive people away or attract the wrong attention.

Yet, if you have a supportive, patient, and curious enough spouse, family member, or friend, they will try to understand you. In turn, they can help you bring out your real shadow emotions and get the help you need.

#5: Shadow Emotions Can Mess You Up

When a suppressed feeling crops up unexpectedly, the effect on you and those around you can be dire. For example, suppressed anger that builds up during childhood can show up in your adult life as domestic violence against your partner.

Here, you need to engage in shadow work to acknowledge and redirect these feelings to beneficial activities. That is, you can use this anger to advocate for children’s right to protection by the state.

#6: Have Self-Compassion

What do you do when you unexpectedly express a shadow emotion? Do you deny its existence, cover it up, fight it, or see the positive side of it? Well, self-compassion dictates that we look at ourselves as unique and whole, even when we have unpleasant feelings.  It also includes taking the chance and letting people into your life, even when you are afraid of getting hurt again.

So:

• Accept your scars lovingly. Know that no one is perfect.
• Observe what triggers shadow emotions in your life. Most likely, these triggers are deep-seated in your subconscious mind.
• Take measures to reprogram your subconscious mind and be in control of your triggers to shadow emotions. Here, you can meditate, listen to positive affirmations, or go for forest baths.
• Give yourself time to heal. Good habits, and emotional reactions, take time to grow.

#7: Convert Your Shadow Emotions into Assertive Anger

Assertive anger is about standing up for you without driving people away. Here, you want to be objective while expressing your thoughts to the other person. You remain open to new ideas. This approach helps you respond better to hurtful criticism.

Conclusion

We learn our emotional reactions, both negative and positive, long before we use them. Hence, if you have shadow emotions, they resemble a person who hurt you in the past. Embrace these feelings to get what you need from yourself and others. Doing so will help you feel and function better. Hence, you react to current situations based on fresh emotions instead of referring to the negative emotions stuck in your subconscious mind.