Feelings are interesting one. I have a love-hate relationship with it. I’m an empath, and it’s hard for me to not take someone else’s energy and not have it greatly affect me. If the world is going through some crazy events such as Stop Asian Hate, Black Lives Matter, that will greatly affect my energy and mood. Lately, I’ve noticed that one of my defense mechanisms is to avoid and pretend it doesn’t exist. For instance, during the COVID-19 pandemic, I acted like there were so many people dying every day. This only works temporarily, but eventually, it comes crashing down on you.

I love my feelings because they helped me create some of the most beautiful, touching memories such as crying 100 days out of 365 days during my participant year during accomplishment coaching. I tend to cry a lot sometimes to process my happiness, and emotions about life. Why is the world so beautiful and so full of fun, and joy, and then the other half of the time I’m present to the destruction of mother nature, watching documentaries about climate change and how we are destroying the planet makes me feel sad. Half of the time I’m optimistic because I’ve seen so many beautiful things in the world with hiking, mountains, rivers, lakes and even during rain I feel connected. 

At times, when I’ve experienced racism or have heard of systemic injustices it breaks my heart. Perhaps the biggest commonality I have with my wife is that she is feeler. When she watches movies and sometimes breaks a bone or gets hurt she always comments Ow… my tailbone.

My feelings go like I’m pretty awesome there you go Impacting lives yay Everyone says I’m super nice, I have good energy, and I’m helpful. I’m making a big difference. Then it goes like oh man, I could have been a better husband today. Oh no, I haven’t called my mom in two weeks. How come she loves me so much and I don’t want to hang out with her every week like she does with me. Does that make me a bad person? Dang, so many people want to hang out but my wife wants me to spend more quality time with her. I guess I should be grateful and I’m fortunate that so many people want to talk to me and hang out with me. What about Davidson time? Man, I feel like I’m so busy interacting with others than I don’t even have time to do what I want to make me happy. But interacting with people makes me happy. The cycle goes on. 

Because I am very feeling based, sometimes I will act based on my feelings and it doesn’t always make logical sense. Why would you leave a top tiered company like LinkedIn where millions of people apply to it every year. Well because I’m feeling adventurous and I want to do something more impactful.

I looked up the word feeling and it is described as an emotional state or reaction. They are eight basic emotions according to Robert Plutchik’s theory- fear, anger, sadness, joy, disgust, surprise, trust, and anticipation. It’s safe to say that I experience all of these in a typical day. From reading articles, watching movies, tv shows, and documentaries. One of the beauties of life is to be able to truly feel all of the feelings. Without disgust there would not be joy. Without sadness and anger then would not be all of the positive emotions. Being a feeler you get to experience life beautifully because everyday is an adventure. 

I often tell people I wouldn’t want you to have my mind because there are thousands of thoughts happening in a given hour. That’s why meditation is such a powerful practice. When I slow down I can be present to the feelings in the moment instead of being over stimulated and feeling all of the emotions at once. Life can be overwhelming but actually feeling the feelings in the moment is what actually makes it less controlling of my life. 

Aristotle says that emotions are anger, friendship, fear, shame, kindness, pity, kindness, envy, love, and indignation. I’m going to touch upon fear because I think thats’ the one that  runs most peoples lives including mine sometimes. We tend to have fears because humans are always trying to survive. The ones who are able to conquer their fears are the ones that I have found to live the most fulfilling lives. 

Every time I conquer a fear such as public speaking or even fear of success. I find myself finding an even bigger obstacle to conquer. I’ve worked hard to conquer so many fears that I’ve learned that there is no such thing as the end goal. There will also be something else to conquer. It’s respecting the process that gives me the most fulfillment. Being able to truly feel the feelings will give us life. For instance, acts of kindness warms my heart and there have been thousands of people who have given and acknowledged myself I have given to thousands of people too. When I give is when I feel the most alive because then it’s not just about me there is another human being that I am impacting. 

UC Berkeley said that there are 27 discrete emotions named during a self reported study- admiration, adoration, aesthetic appreciation, amusement, anger, anxiety, awe, awkwardness, boredom, calmness, confusion, craving, disgust, empathetic pain, entrancement, excitement, fear, horror, interest, joy, annoyed, nostalgia, relief, romance, sadness, satisfaction, sexual desire, and surprise. 

Embrace the highs and respect the lows.

Being alone is one the most difficult things in the world for me. It was so bad that at one point if its been an hour since I’ve been alone I get all weird and lonely. I’ve since learned to get better at that and I can go on dates with myself but it was certainly a hard practice. Being alone for an entire day by myself I don’t think I’ve ever done that before. It begs the question: What is it about being by myself that is so hard to be with? 

When I think about this question, what comes up is that I was born into a pretty big family where my dad has 12 siblings so there is a lack of privacy and personal space. Unlike my wife where each person in the family has sufficient space to be themselves, my sisters and I lived on top of each other in a really small apartment where we lived in the living room for instance. Just being around people all of the time I was used to that growing up. My house now is interesting because there are so many rooms that sometimes we have trouble finding each other. My wife claims that our office is too far away. The crazy thing is that I took a 100% remote job and I never thought ever in a million years I would do that because I wanted to challenge myself to be comfortable with being with myself. 

I’m still in sales so don’t get me wrong I’m still always in meetings and I’m meeting people everyday. I used to judge myself so hard but not being able to give myself space to breathe. Meditation is extremely helpful to be able to tap deeper into my intuition and be clear on what I care about.