Making Friends With Difficult Emotions
One way to find a wise response is through understanding that difficult emotions like anger, fear, shame, and grief almost always involve a mix of conceptual and somatic (bodily felt) elements. The conceptual part involves the particulars of the situation that is giving rise to the emotions: its “storyline.” The somatic element is the way in which we experience the emotion in our bodies. If we are angry with someone, for example, there is the storyline of what they said or did that triggered our anger—That was unfair / What they said is wrong / They should know better!...