Talk and Tales from Coco, Optimist in Charge at The Shiny Butter Blog
Come alive, stay real
Shiny greetings, Reader,
It's not Father Time and Mother Nature that age us.
It's the collection we've amassed and stored and hoarded in our interior that takes its toll on us.
It's the emotions we've set aside for later. The piles we've made of our pain, losses, grievances, anger, sadness and grief, disappointment, rage.
They fester.
But I'll clarify. They fester when we override them, bury them, don't want to see them, try not to notice them, and (supposedly) move on in spite of them.
Here are some ways to keep the festering to a minimum in order to keep emotions moving along, lest they become like stagnant water inside our very being.
Look for the source
I love the little book by Louise Hay called "Heal Your Body," where she lists one physical ailment after another along with its emotional origins and a couple of affirmations with which to address it.
Traditional Chinese Medicine works the same way—looks at the origins of emotions and where they land in the body. Did you know, for example, that the lungs are associated with grief and the liver with anger?
Looking closely for the origin of an imbalance in the body is a solid way to address the emotions that create the opening for what goes awry in our body.
The human body is self-healing and wise.
The things that go wrong in our body are, first of all, actually the body's defense and healing response, and second of all, symptoms of what lies beneath and inside.
The symptom itself is the signal, not the issue. What we usually call the problem is actually a surface indication of what started with emotions.
Recognize the brain's bossy ways
The human brain is wired for survival. For practical stuff.
It's not particularly cooperative with the heart's "feeling" ways. It would rather avoid emotions, in fact.
But the brain is powerful and influential and pretty bossy, so what we end up doing, is we just keep forging ahead when the going gets tough. Emotions get in the way, so we just set them aside.
But no matter how practical we are, the heart is collecting emotions, even if we have better ideas.
And, of course, we all know what it's like for things to come to the surface anyway.
And they always do.
Somehow, some way they always show up. We know this.
So maybe override the brain's self-protective ways on this one.
Write it down
Writing about what's bothering us is powerful. And it's not just because we get to bitch in private.
It's because the act of writing by hand brings forth things we don't even know we're thinking and feeling. It's absolutely wild how well this works.
It's our whole being working together. A miracle, in fact.
[Use typing for this if you're physically unable to write by hand, or use speech-to-text if neither writing nor typing are available to you.]
Writing what you're feeling and thinking is ideal for revealing emotions we're used to storing away. Give yourself some time to try this, and be prepared to be surprised.
Keep in mind: it's not just for venting—start with venting, sure, but explore, too.
Burn it
When you want to release an emotion, you can write it down and then burn the paper it's on.
Some people say the full moon is good for this... Some say the new moon.
I say do it when you feel moved to do it. Something inside you is leading you. Trust that.
Alternately, I know someone who wrote something in washable marker on a rock and then threw it in a river. Beautiful symbolism and a satisfying way to let go.
Throw it off of you
Fling your arms from side to side. Whoosh the energy from your body and into the air like you're brushing something off of you and out of you. (You are.)
Do this regularly. Every day. Even more than once a day.
It's a way of releasing energy. It's not always necessary to name or even recognize lingering emotions in order to release them.
You can even talk to the energy you want to send on its way. You can visualize the unnecessary or the burdensome as you release it.
Sounds like gobbly goop. Isn't.
Look it in the eye
Stop your busy-ness long enough to square up with your emotions.
Be straight-up and honest as you look.
You don't have to tell a soul what you find or what you're looking for.
You only have to be still long enough... and willing to look directly inside yourself at your emotions.
Get your body back in its groove
It's more challenging to regulate the emotions when the body is badly out of balance than when the body is balanced. We see this when we're in physical pain of some kind—we'd act better if we felt better.
...Because the body gets out of its perfect groove, you know.
We get out of balance. We feel off. Things aren't operating right—or are operating quite badly, in fact.
So not only do our emotions have a helluva lot to do with what gets off track in our body, when our body feels off so do our emotions. It's a cycle.
More and more, I'm choosing healing modalities that work with my body in order to restore balance. Western convention has us addressing the symptoms of what's wrong rather than... what's actually wrong, and I'm pretty much over this.
I'm using homeopathy these days because it's powerful yet simple in helping restore whole-body balance. Here's the book I'm working with right now for my "home prescribing" journey. (This is my affiliate link.)
Whatever you choose—herbal tinctures, essential oils, acupuncture, massage, supplements, integrative medicine, red light therapy, homeopathy, or all of the above, look for helping your body right itself.
Talk about it
This one's obvious.
Talk about your emotions to a trusted friend. Talk to yourself. Talk in a support group. Talk to a therapist. Talk to a coach.
It all works.
Just talk out loud to someone in order to process your emotions (not just complain—that's fine for a bit, but it's a dead end if that's the aim of and extent of our talking).
And that's the thing
It all works.
And it's important to do something rather than do nothing about our emotions.
It's easy to be a fair-weather friend and only pay attention to the emotions that feel good, which is what we tend to do.
But the less pleasant emotions that we leave to linger, smolder, and fester in the background of our being are gunking our insides and aging us, inside and out.
Think of someone you've seen who's older but glows. They have a presence that transcends years.
It's not that they're buckling down to begrudgingly "deal with their emotions," but it's pretty likely they have a way of rolling with life rather than suppressing it.
It's pretty likely they have an attitude that's kept them balanced along life's rocky shores.
It's likely they've figured out a way to deal with their emotions rather than hauling everything they've ever felt with them forevermore.
This is what we're aiming for.
Peace in our very being.
It's the fountain of youth.
Thanks for being on the other side of the screen today
Remember—stay peaceful, curious, and real.
And shine on, my friend,
Coco
p.s. Like I say above, it all works.
Try it all.
If talking to a coach is one way you'd like to process emotions, schedule a one-hour consultation with me. This isn't a coaching session—it's a structured conversation I use where we evaluate what you're looking for and how you can get it.
I love me some shiny things, but with all of AI's promises and assurances, I still choose the slow, hands-on, manual, analog, self-reliant, old-school, defiantly non-plagiarized path of writing—without asking any form of AI for ideas, inspiration, or even proofreading and grammar correction (because I've discovered it's not as good or "intuitive" as it claims to be at those, either).
[Also, as of 5/6/25 all photos are my own (not stock) unless otherwise stated.]
