Numbness is easy.

It’s easy not to feel what is going on around you. Through not feeling, we don’t have to deal or cope.

Dealing and coping. Now, that’s a little harder.

Feeling. That is the hardest.

We walk through life and through different experiences that lead us to feel every type of way. We feel happiness, sadness, and anger. We feel bitter, confused and hopeless. We feel eager, jovial and content. All these feelings steer us through our days, but how often do we focus on actually feeling these feelings? We recognize these familiar and unfamiliar sensations but we rarely experience them. We don’t bask in our delight like we bask in the sun nor do we sink into our gloom like we sink into bed at night.

This is due in part to the others around you. We don’t want to project our feelings on to anyone else, whether they be positive or negative. We are afraid to bring overly good or bad energy into our everyday interactions. We adjust our feelings constantly. This never-ending adjustment of feeling leads to neutralization. We neutralize how we feel to achieve a more average or socially acceptable mood.

Sometimes we don’t have the time to be perceptive of these feelings. We are so busy trying to make it to the end of the day, week or month that our feelings whiz by seemingly unnoticed. However, these feelings are noticed; not consciously, but subconsciously. While we progress through our overly scheduled lives trying to complete the tasks that have piled up, our feelings pile up. They pile up somewhere just out of reach but yet, remain right on the edge of our realization. Then, right when we get to that edge, with the pile towering over us, we feel. When we finally feel we are swept into a stream of emotional pandemonium.

We should let go of our focus on neutralization and our procrastination of feeling. We should connect to our center, observing all the sensations around us and within us. We should recognize the good, the bad and the in between for all they are and all they are not. We should stop trying to resist and ignore. We should appreciate the ability we have to feel something, anything and nothing. Sometimes, all at the same time. There is a reason for your feelings and they matter.

Give in to the thoughts, dreams and people that penetrate your psyche. Give in to giving up the fight of concealment. Let your emotions suffuse your life and your time. Quit letting the numbness take over and stiffen you from the outside in. Stop holding it all in, all the time. Make the time to understand and dissect how you feel and why you feel that way. Don’t try to feel the “right way” because it is OK to feel the “wrong way.” Deal and cope with what you must. Listen to yourself and indulge in feeling.