What do I do at times when I feel angey, times when I feel irritated, times when I feel unsettled?

What can we use to really guide us?

I'm going to give you three questions and a bonus question of things that you can think about.

What What am I feeling? This is a right-now/in-the-moment feeling. It could be right on the surface and it might be something that you have to dive down into a little bit deeper, especially when you are feeling riled up, irritated, angry, frustrated, explosive. This is a really important key thing to answer.

There can be lots of mental reasons of what's going wrong and whether people should be doing but the important question to be asking one of several is, "what am I feeling"? This will start to lead us in a down and inward way so we can see what is really the root of what's happening.

The truth is it's usually not about what it's about. What that means is what appears to be the problem on the surface is usually not the heart of the problem underneath. It's not the source of the problem underneath. We can be very certain in our mind saying, "the problem is that this person did this because if they wouldn't have done this, I wouldn't have felt this way".

Starting to turn towards to what we're feeling, especially connected with our values as well. We can start to turn inwards and see where is the snag in our mind body system. Is there some Subtle Body block that created some Velcro in me that really gives this situation a charge.

​We're not saying someone will do something dumb and obviously offensive or hurtful and you're going to feel great about it. That's not really what we're talking about. What we're saying is when you notice that there's an ongoing irritation or a huge burst of emotion or irritation or anger that's lasting with you, that's when we really need to dive underneath to start to dissect and see, "wait a minute, what am I feeling underneath?"

It might just be anger on the surface but as you go deeper, there might be something else. There might be fear, there might be sadness. My working hypothesis is that usually anger is not a primary emotion. It's usually covering over feeling scared, feeling worried, feeling insecure. 

Here are three questions and you could even write them on a note card. When you feel blinded by a situation or a strong emotion, you could just open up the cupboard or the bathroom mirror where you have these written and ask and reflect on these questions. 

1. Who am I really?
2. What do I value?
3. ​What am I feeling?

Now I'll give you a fourth one that you can add in sometimes. If you're really feeling worked up, you may or may not have the capacity to ask this in the moment and that's okay. The fourth optional question is "where is the inner knowing directing me?" or "where am I being directed?"

To answer this question, we have to be able to come to that more aligned place where we can be more quiet and be more inward to really listen and hear what's actually there. Sometimes that's just not possible when we're in the thick of things. That's why it's number four optional. 

You are a soul with a body and you deserve great things!

Does meditation help us with trauma and healing? The short answer is kind of, but not often. The reason that I say that is what most people call meditation and your ability to go into more meditative states is dependent on the wiring of your Subtle Body.

Meditation is not purely a mind thing because we're not thinking. That's what I think people don't even stop to think about. Meditation calms the mind, but it calms the mind because it's touching in with the values or the energy channels. It's focusing your layers of your Subtle Body in order to be more harmonized.

The reason that we feel refreshed is that we are more integrated when we're trying to settle the mind or focus the mind so that it's not interfering with the rest of the Subtle Body. It's not often that meditation helps your trauma. It's true that spiritual practice in general, ultimately everything will be brought to the surface and unified and healed in your own process towards oneness with the one, but it is a long process. It might take you a couple of lifetimes.

What I've seen, and I've been a part of different spiritual communities and traditions and qi gong and yoga, and I've really had been blessed to be in the company of spiritual masters of different traditions, and also had mentors who were therapists and worked in that way. I've seen the different sides that people can approach this from.

What tends to be more true is that trauma work ends up supporting and helping to go deeper in your meditation. Because if you have a block in your Subtle Body, it's going to be very difficult to go into any deeper states of meditation without a super deep dive.

The exception to that is doing pretty intensive spiritual practices that most people are not really set up to do. Like doing a deep dive, 10 day silent retreat, working with a qualified teacher one-on-one, meditating for long periods at a time over a series of days. For most modern people that aren't in a monastic tradition, that's really harder to do.

In my experience using Subtle Body techniques is the way to start to heal your Subtle Body. So then low to moderate meditative types will be able to function better and lead you into that deeper way more organically.

It's a really big topic. I can't teach you 12 weeks in this two minutes, but I'll give you the basic overview. 

• N we Notice it, "Oh, it seems like there's a little wind here. I wonder where the sensation is in my body.
  
  
• T we Turn towards it. This seems simple, but it's huge. Most of us are used to pushing away and avoiding that sensation whenever we feel that emotion or that wind come up. We turn the other way and try to get rid of it as quickly as possible. Although that's a natural reaction, it actually causes the emotion to stay stuck.
  
  
• B Bring it closer. This is where we really have to use Subtle Body energy-appropriate techniques like the ones that you will learn through the 7 Days To A More Grounded You Audio Course.

​Remember, you are a soul with a body and your path reflects that. Sending you lots of love!

How do I deal with the difficulties that happen in life?

This starts to get us down to this deeper level of what our working spiritual hypothesis is in the world, because one of the things that many spiritual traditions understand (depending on your viewpoint) is that suffering is a part of life. The Eastern school of thought is that we have to recognize that no matter what, whether you are spiritually enlightened or an average Joe, nobody gets out of here without difficulty.

One of the important lessons that I'm often coaching people on is a stepping stone that we have to start to separate out the difference between what is difficulty in life and what is suffering.

People will say, "well, what about this issue with my friends?" or "what about this issue with my family? I really feel stuck."

You'll notice that when you bring up an issue, it's like this big jumble of a lot of different feelings and emotions and sensations in your body and reasons why it should be somewhere, should be another way. This is always a recipe for disaster.

What we learned to do is a two-step process.