Where in the body is emotions felt?

[DaveTyler]

I have been emotionallly numb for several weeks now not being able to cry, get angry, feel joy, anything. Completely apathetic.
Could this just be a false belief? hypochondriac kind of thing?
I feel like I feel emotions in my stomach, but nothing in my head , please shed some light on this issue?

[sadavis00]

Wow, that's strange, I've felt apathetic but never lost the ability to feel. Maybe you can turn this into a postive experience by conciously associating that feeling in your stomach with a positive emotion. I know when I feel bad, and I my emotions cause bad feelings in my heart, I conciously tell myself that those feelings are something else, something positive like love, and through some kind of a feedback loop, my external positive experience makes me feel good inside too. This may sound dumb, but somehow it works (not always).

[jacmac1]

Incest survivors for example, or those who have suffered severe trauma can split their emotions and deaden a part of themselves.

That is, they will feel nothing at all, have no recognition of the emotion, but have a knot in their stomach or a headache.

I have felt this.

I call this the split between the head and the heart.

The emotions are too overwhelming so your body mentally disconnects from them to preserve your sanity, but because the emotions are real, they do have an effect. Energy can only be displaced and does not disappear.

Thus the feeling in your stomach.


Did something happen?

[DaveTyler]

yes, reading about subjective reality caused it together with extreme panic over it.
Does it ever come back? I find no reason for living, I feel completely dead

[Logicseeker]

DaveTyler, I think you should talk to a therapist.
The articles on subjective reality are just sketchy ideas, you should not read them as gospel. Most people, including those with high awareness do not share their thoughts with Pavlina and those alike.

I think your numbness could be due to depression and a number of other factors. I think you should seek help now! because apathy will lead to passivity and once this starts you won't find the motiovation for doing it. I've felt completely numb for 5 years so I know what i'M talking about,

[ethereal]

It might also be a high spiritual state. Some people who haven't experienced deep, abiding peace may mistake it for "emotional deadness" or apathy, because the outward symptoms look pretty much the same.

Something that might be similar to what you're talking about:
Loneliness in Influence

I think other people with more experience might be able to make better comments. I've temporarily gone through several "emotional dry spells" but they were very short, so I don't know too much about your situation, other than that it can come up unexpectedly from doing spiritual work (which SR actually is).

[DaveTyler]

So once I enter the state of passive theres no way back?
U havent felt emotions at all the past 5 years?

[Logicseeker]

Originally Posted by DaveTyler

So once I enter the state of passive theres no way back?
U havent felt emotions at all the past 5 years?

Once you're in a passive depressed mental state it is almost impossible to get out of it without pressional help from a psychiatrist/psychologist. And no, I have not felt any real emotions the last five years. I don't cry when my relatives die, I didn't feel happy when I graduated school, I can run over the railway without feeling fear and so on. I have a little emotion but 95% is indifference.

[Simmiah]

I have experienced what you're talking about. I was abused as a child & I had a subsequent split...in fact when I took the myers-briggs test I came out as a T but nowadays I am a borderline T/F.

Anyhow back to the posting! I didn't have therapy to help me out of it & actually the state was so pervasive I didn't even notice that I didn't "feel" the way others did. I didn't cry & considered that a positive. It wasn't until I moved away from the source of the intense trauma (my parents) that I started to wake back up.

& then after that I had to confront the intense emotions underneath & begin to heal what was going on with me. That process took years but now I am a fully emotional person

Anyways, I wonder what the article contained which triggered such intense panic as you described? I would ask your deepest self that question: What was triggered by the article? What in the article resonated so deeply that I panicked?

Try taking a big breath & stepping back. Any insight you have inside will be more helpful for you than any guesses the rest of us may have. I do hope I have been of some help through my own experience.

[DaveTyler]

It was the trigger of loneliness, subjective reality claims your all alone in the whole universe, I deny to believe that.
All of you have your own conciousness, just like I have mine.
Something created the universes laws, not me but something, source, god, creator or whatever you want to call it.
When we were born, we came from this divine light, so yeah, in the end we're all the same, but as in human form, we're individuals, with different lifes.
Right?

[Dharma]

The emotional body is best felt in the belly area of the physical body. Focus on the belly and see if you feel tightness or tension there. If there is, focus on it and tell yourself to "soften" the energy. Your mind will not know what soften means, but your emotional body will respond to it.

Sounds like you need to get your emotional body moving. Find something that makes you feel... memories, a walk in the woods, a tear-jerker movie. A therapist might not be a bad idea.

[Liara Covert]

Hi Dave Tyler.

Postings in this thread offer you good suggestions. Counselling may be useful.

Emotionally sensitive people tend to feel things sooner than others, and yet, they may be very good at denial or repressing emotions. If a person doesn't seem to sense emotion, that person may have numbed himself from painful feelings or may have never learned emotional awareness. Sensitive people I have known were influenced by abusive environments. They learned ways to numb themselves from their feelings because so many of their feelings are painful.

I would recommend Daniel Coleman's book called Emotional Intelligence
Barnes***&***Noble.com - Books: Emotional Intelligence, by Daniel P. Goleman, Hardcover, 10th Anniversary edition

[DaveTyler]

Thanks guys.
Yeah I've always had EXTREME emotions, too much sometimes, but when facing no emotions, I'd choose heavy depression over this anytime.
I can't live without emotions, it's impossible to lead a life without emotions.
I can't even feel having a panic attack, I can't get shocked when someone tries to scare me, NOTHING touches me.

Is there a hope for recovery?

[bellbird]

Of course there is.
Take what counsel you think would come closest to what would work for you. Find someone you can trust and talk to them. Times is a great healer always, but it's beneficial for you to know why you felt so strongly about what you read. Saying it might work itself out is probably not the best way to go in your situation. And yes, I agree with you on:

All of you have your own conciousness, just like I have mine.
Something created the universes laws, not me but something, source, god, creator or whatever you want to call it.
When we were born, we came from this divine light, so yeah, in the end we're all the same, but as in human form, we're individuals, with different lifes.
Right?

Yup
Take care of yourself please.

[DaveTyler]

The reason I felt so hardcore about it was because I have OCD, which is a anxiety disorder who blows up every negative thing.
I can obsess about any negative thing, and it causes major distress, my whole life has become a big panic attack...
I'll keep you all updated

Thanks guys

[Andy]

I experienced a few of those things along with when I went into the subjective reality mindset. At first when I was considering it this fear took over me and I started to freak out that everything was "made up" by me and I might create bad things since I was in control of the reality. I decided to keep going with it since I'd rather see how it turned out, that freak out went away once I realized everything was still fine and alright.

The loneliness I only experienced for a small amount of time. It subsided when I stopped thinking of me as my body and all those other "bodies" as fake, instead with subjective reality you're basically everything, one with the universe etc. etc. Your body is as much you as any other body, everyone's connected...and a few of those realizations made me feel the complete opposite of lonely.

Not feeling emotions...yep I went through that for awhile. It was nice for a time, but after awhile I wanted to enjoy emotions again as life became a bit blah without them as I started seeing life as having no point and all that. To get them back I basically just "willed" them back. It was while I was watching a movie that I remembered feeling strong sorrow for in the past. I wanted to feel that again, so I forced myself to feel the sorrow that I used to by reminding myself why it was sad. With that done my emotions overall seemed to come back.

I think part of it is working on your beliefs, if theres anything that seems to be trying to keep your emotions down see if you can pinpoint them. Feeling emotions for the sake of feeling them is completely reasonable, that's what I had to decide since I kept thinking there was no point when I thought everything was "meaningless"