Building Emotional and Spiritual Immunity
- Aug 2, 2016
- 6 min read
Fundamental Shift in Values
Building emotional immunity - emotional strength, endurance and resilience, is very much like managing the efficiency and sustainability of a key resource in a business. I’m using this analogy, because we can all relate to efficiently running a car, but we seldom think of applying the same approach and logic to our own inner resources when running our lives. Many of us have a tendency to take our inner resources for granted and run on “auto-mode”, mistakenly assuming that everything "is as it should be" and will “unfold as it should”. We assume that no conscious effort (management and maintenance) is required and if things do go wrong, we "outsource" "the problem" to a Coach, Psychologist, Psychiatrist, Guru, Priest or other "Authority" to "fix" us. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying there is no place (role) for health professionals. I am saying there is much we can do ourselves, before getting an external professional involved. Building emotional immunity requires a fundamental shift of values (1) seeing ourselves as responsible for our own emotional health (2) seeing ourselves as our own inner authority and (3) being in the world, firmly grounded in this responsibility and authority.
Nourishment
We need to clearly understand what nourishes (recharges/feeds) us emotionally and make this conscious in our lives. Be curious, explore, look for subtleties and make distinctions. For example, I recommend as an exploration, Sorting the Seeds. Once we’ve named what emotionally nourishes us, we need to express it and share it with those around us, so they know what we need, and through our communication can get to know us better. I highly recommend that we write down (journal) all our self-realisations on what nourishes us emotionally, so we can refer back to them when we forget (and we do!). We need to consciously plan to include as much nourishment as possible in our week and put into practice what we’ve learnt. Practice emotionally digests our personal realisations making them part of our bloodstream. If we find ourselves running dry emotionally, we need to go back to our journals. Notice how we later read our own realisations, like they were written by someone else and we’re reading them for the first time! We need to ask ourselves, what are we getting out of forgetting? What are we getting from being emotionally depleted? Yes, we are human beings, we forget - but I would like us to challenge ourselves around this "habit" of forgetting - about falling asleep to what is vitally important to our emotional health.
Efficiency
Are we using our emotional energy efficiently? Are we wasting emotional energy? We need to learn to recognise emotionally draining patterns – “the same old story that essentially never ends differently” – and make a conscious choice not to be a part of them anymore. Break the self-defeating patterns! Make them conscious, speak them out and write them down. We need to become conscious of our emotional triggers and learn to manage our emotional wounds – simple but difficult rules, like consciously recognising and acknowledging that we're emotionally triggered, not reacting when we are triggered and learning to self-soothe the wounded aspects of ourselves.
Appropriate Neutrality
We need to create a habit of checking-in on our emotional state and becoming conscious of what we are feeling and asking whether our emotional charge is appropriate or not - and if not, consciously endeavour to reach a more emotionally neutral place. This is a slippery slope I know, because more often than not, we've opened the fridge door and burying our emotions with food etc.
Are we “emotionally ruminating” - over-processing stuff from the past? Are we emotionally engaging in future (possible) worst case scenarios? I'm not saying don't do future scenario planning - I'm saying we need to be conscious of our emotional charge while entertaining the idea of something that may not happen. We need to be curious as to why we are so emotionally charged, make a mental note and journal about it later - but endeavour to reach a more neutral emotional space in the moment.
We need to challenge ourselves to remain emotionally neutral when caught up in acute or chronically negative situations. Generating inappropriate emotional melodrama, creates noise and invites interference, drains our emotional resources and chronically erodes our emotional immunity.
Life is Messy
We need to avoid expecting life to be perfect and responding in a shocked, incredulous or indignant way (all emotionally draining), when things deviate from the "ideal". We need to better acquaint ourselves with the reality that life is messy and issues are inevitable - and confront our idealism, perfectionism and wishful thinking. We need to learn to improvise, so we can trust that we have the skills to resolve issues efficiently, if and when they arise. We need to give ourselves feedback for handling difficult situations well, consciously acknowledging our improvisation skills - patting ourselves on the back.
Support
Having emotional support is crucial for building emotional immunity. We need to nurture relationships in which we can be authentic, vulnerable and imperfect. We need to nurture the ability to ask for help - it is not always easy. Important here too, is having clarity and making distinctions between our different relationship roles (mother, daughter, employer, wife, friend etc). Getting the right kind of support that motivates us to build a good support network, relies on being discerning about these role distinctions.
We need to learn to kneel down and pray if we have to. Creating an imaginary friend when we run out of other options, also helps. We need to make conscious our habit of withdrawing and not seeking support when we really need it. Does this habit really serve us? What do we get by not asking for help?
Building Spiritual Immunity
The following twelve ideas on building spiritual immunity were inspired by Maurice Fernandez’s Spiritual Development workshop. These ideas are intended to evoke an inner charge and emotional response and in so doing, provide clues on where to start with building your own spiritual immunity – so watch and listen closely.
Accept that life includes a struggle. Fight the good fight. Be open to your struggles teaching you something new.
Make peace with your “matter”. Your body is an expression and anchor for your soul and a source of exquisite pleasure. Embody, honour and value it.
Accept the mystery of life. There will always be something you do not yet know. Accept that learning is eternal. You will never figure everything out. Be patient when you do not understand – when you do not get the answers. It is okay not to know.
Build something (support system) to hold you in your weak moments. Accept the fact that it is okay to sometimes depend on others. Life is a wheel – sometimes you are at the top and sometimes you are at the bottom. Trust that things will change. Learn to be patient through the process. Accept “foreign” into your life - difference builds immunity.
Believe that your life matters – that you have a special purpose and destiny that no one else can fulfil.
Trust the detours, dead-ends and crossroads - they are all productive. It is okay to step out of your comfort zone and face the unknown.
The road to peace is a tumultuous one. Be curious about the role that conflict plays in keeping the peace. Preserve your individuality. Don’t compromise yourself to keep the peace.
Life is a puzzle – it needs to be approached piece by piece. Be ready for change. Ask yourself “What can die in me today, so that something else may live?”
You are not stuck in The Matrix. There is always a way out. Choose the Red Pill.
Trust that there is a greater order (pattern) to life. That which is depraved and immoral is not sustainable. If you feel there is lack, step up and lead by example.
You do not always have the luxury to see the tree blossom, from the seeds you have planted. Just because you don’t get to see the blossom, doesn’t mean your efforts are wasted. Have patience - change is slow because it needs to be integrated into the personal and collective to take effect.
Accept life as it is, both the good with the bad. It’s not what happens to you that’s important, but how you respond to what happens to you. Keep your faith in the goodness of life. Focus on those momentary, revelatory experiences that make sense.
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