Lessons from Children

I’ve never been a big baby person (they generally make me super nervous though I love them) but they can offer such simple yet profound teachings. Today I was walking through the woods with a friend and his two year old son. At one point, the boy fell. For a few moments, he was screaming sobs but then, it was gone. In another few moments, he was giggling and running around again.

As we grow older, we’re taught to repress our emotions. When we get hurt, we’re taught we’re not supposed to let it show. We’re supposed to tough it out. The problem is, when we do this, whatever the hurt is stays with us. It has no means of escape. As we continue through life, hurts just keep piling. They make us sad. They make us sick.

Alright, so maybe if you fall down in a museum it’s not kosher to start loudly sobbing but, I think it is so important to find a healthy way to release. Find time when you can scream and cry and get it all out. It’s ok! Then you can process and let go and you don’t have to carry the heavy weights of your grief.

This reminds me of something I heard in a talk about the benefits of yoga for trauma therapy. The woman was explaining how, when an opossum is being hunted by something, as we know it plays dead. After the predator leaves, the opossum starts to shake. It has to physically release the trauma of being hunted.

Just the same, we need to release the traumas we face throughout life. Whether it’s a faceplant in the woods or a broken heart, it gives us nothing to hold it in. It does not serve us to hold back the tears, to stand still and pretend it’s all fine. Crying is our way of shaking off the predator. To feel things fully is the only way we can move on. It is also the only way we can feel joy, love, happiness fully.

So I invite you to notice your responses when you fall. We’ve been taught to repress our natural instincts and emotions so there is no need to judge yourself if this is what you notice you do. But maybe you can start to play with finding your method of “shaking it off”, like the opossum. I am naturally a big proponent of yoga for this but whatever it is for you, play with it and see what you can release!