Do Emotions Go Away?

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image by Jan R. Olsen


From: Reflections of the One Life by Scott Kiloby

During the spiritual search, there can be an erroneous belief that, in enlightenment, feelings go away and nothing is felt. This is a false myth.

In the so-called egoic state, the dream self tends to avoid and escape emotions. You take drugs, drink alcohol, eat too much, work too much, engage in activity that keeps the mind stimulated, strategize about the future, exert control, complain, blame, or otherwise think or act your way out of feeling emotions directly.

The movie of self is directed at avoiding what is in this moment. It is only natural that the movie would imagine enlightenment to be the ultimate method of escaping emotions.

Enlightenment is a natural state in which emotions are felt directly and immediately in the moment they arise. There isn’t a “you” choosing to feel emotions. They simply arise fully in awareness. You no longer feed the story of time, which is the story of self. Feelings are not accumulated along a time-bound storyline. They are allowed to come and go freely. There is no person there attempting to avoid, escape, or analyze them.

In awakening, anything is possible in the opening known as “you.” There can be awakeness to a moment of emotional explosion or to a moment of no feeling whatsoever. Everything is allowed. Nothing is pushed away.

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