Yes- I am feeling both silly and sad, reflective and energized, and deep in the feels of the feely feels. I like to call this type of time an emotionally dense moment- for the feelings I am feeling are seeping with intensity and flare.
It’s October, a month that is personally loaded with major life milestones and memories… a month that is huge for the breast cancer community (“patients” and loved ones alike)… a month that stirs all the feels- asking you to somehow bare witness to it all. Something that for most of us is tremendously hard to do.
So when you are feeling all of the feely feels- what is your instinct?
Do you build a wall of protection, to safeguard you from falling apart but one that also prevents you from connecting?
Do you find a deep need to flee away- escaping from the pain that beckons at your doorstep?
Do you stuff the feelings so far in that you end up feeling numb or disconnected from recalling exactly what it was that you pushed away?
The thing is, if you want to feel authentic joy and connection, you cannot afford to only allow certain thoughts and feelings into the party while excluding those which cause you alarm. They come as a package.
Often we feel like it is impossible to allow all of the feels to be present at the same time- it feels completely overwhelming. Yet often it is our fear that prevents us from exploring the possibility of creating a container large enough to allow them to be.
Because this month is so tender, I want to offer what I can to my community. As I mentioned in a video yesterday, I recently opened a closed FaceBook group- Creating Connection with Creative Transformations. I’d love to spend this month with you all using art, creativity, and check ins with one another to help you build that container. You can find the group by going to Creative Transformations’ FaceBook page or by emailing me.
-Stephanie McLeod-Estevez, LCPC, is an art therapist and breast cancer survivor, and a former oncology counselor at the Dempsey Center. She began Creative Transformations to help others who are healing emotionally from cancer. Through Creative Transformations, she works with people in person and online to offer the self assessment tool, cancer coaching, an Art as Therapy program, virtual workshops, and this weekly blog. Sign up today so you never miss a blog and find us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.