Follow the Feels

Do you ever find yourself not knowing what to do next? It can happen on a micro level like not being able to choose breakfast on a menu or changing your clothes three times because nothing feels right. Or it can happen on a macro level like wanting to move locales but not knowing where to, or not knowing if you should continue in a friendship, or wondering if now is the time to leave your staid-but-secure job and launch out on your own.

Choice is a good thing. Not everyone has the privilege of choice. At the same time, uncertainty and indecision can be anxiety-inducing, ranging from itchy-sweater irritation to full-out paralysis. My neighbor lost her husband a few years ago. On top of all of the grief and adjustment and figuring out how to raise her kids alone, a repetitive fear was that she believed she couldn't make decisions. Her husband had made all the decisions previously and she worried she wouldn't be able to move their life forward.

Indecision can be a way to avoid failure, looking stupid or disappointing others. Unfortunately, it can also cause anxiety, regret, shame and rumination. One approach to getting things moving? Follow the feels. This is in line with going with your gut but takes it farther. Our intuition (gut) has been shown to be more intelligent than our brains. According to research at Brittanica[1], the human brain can process about 50 bits of information per second, while the human body can process 11 million bits of information per second. This helps to explain the phenomenon of animals being able to sense an earthquake before it happens or the hair raising on your skin when you're in danger, even if it's not immediately apparent. Bottom line, your brain might not be your best ally when it comes to making decisions.

But what if you don’t know what's in your gut? How can you know when it's giving you useful information? It's in the feels. And feels begin with presence. One of the techniques that Eckhart Tolle shares with his followers who are looking for a way to drop into presence, is to "feel the inside of your hands". Most of us, even in the throes of a worry-filled night, can pause enough to feel the inside of our hands. Usually it’s a feeling of, for lack of a better word, aliveness. For a moment, that puts the thinking brain on pause. From there, you can feel the inside of your feet. And perhaps from there you can work your way up through your legs, torso, back, neck and up into your head. Any “aliveness” that you can tune into and just notice, without thought, brings you into presence.

From there, work with a decision at hand. Hold one of the options in mind, imagining the components of it in as much detail as possible - colors, people, locations, conversations. Marry that imagining back to your inner-body awareness. How does it feel now? Light and free? Heavy and restrained? Do the same with your next option. How does it feel compared to the first option? Try not to attach emotions to the assessment, as they can put you back into brain-spinning. Try to notice physical feelings. One category of feeling might include lightness, spaciousness, relaxation, warmth, a feeling of freedom or lifting. Another set of feelings might include heaviness, closing down, heat or cold, itchiness or "bugs under the skin". Chances are that your options will register differently in your body and therefore give you different information. The goal? Follow the ones that feel free.

Writer and teacher Martha Beck says that “enlightenment tastes like freedom” and that the “feels” your body is giving you are a compass directing you to your best life. Think of them like a yellow brick road. Either way you go, you’ll still encounter lions and tigers and bears, but at least you’ll be confronting them from a place of freedom, lightness and space. And that may be enough.

[1] https://www.britannica.com/science/information-theory/Physiology