Gratitude List

Things I'm grateful for this month:

Imbolg
Clock Tower 3 and Haunting Ground (PS2 games)- been re-playing them.
Buying an iTunes voucher with my Maximiles points
Ariana Grande's new album coming out
The lighter, longer days- spring is coming!
Daffodils
Amy Tan's Where the Past Begins- currently reading it
Sunny days

Feeling Your Emotions- Shame

This is the next post in the Feeling Your Emotions series. You can read the introduction post here: https://fallingpetalsuk.blogspot.com/2017/11/feeling-your-emotions-introduction.html

So far I've covered anger, sadness and depression, and fear and anxiety. Now I'm moving onto shame.

Disclaimer: I'm not a doctor, so if you're having mental/physical issues please seek medical help in addition to reading this. :)

When I first started this series I had a vague order to do it in. I started out with the more "negative" emotions. I think it makes sense to write about shame now because it's something you can also feel along with the other emotions already mentioned. For example you may feel shame for being angry, sad or scared. It's quite a heavy emotion and I felt some resistance to writing this post, but I feel it's an important subject. So let's start by looking more closely at shame. :)


What is shame?

Shame is described as "a painful feeling of humiliation and distress caused by the consciousness of wrong or foolish behaviour", and a "regrettable or unfortunate situation or action" (Oxford English dictionary), "a painful feeling that's a mix of regret, self-hate and dishonor" (Vocabulary.com) and "a painful emotion caused by consciousness of guilt, shortcoming or impropriety" (Merriam Webster). We can feel shame ourselves due to something we've said or done (although this may be more like guilt, see below), or because we feel not good enough. We "shame" others for doing or saying something we believe is wrong, or that goes against the general rules of society and we also use phrases such as "That's a shame" when something doesn't work out as planned.

Shame is not a "core emotion". The basic emotions are said to be happiness, sadness, anger, fear, disgust and surprise. (They've been grouped further into "joy-sadness", "anger-fear", "trust-distrust" and "surprise-anticipation". In fact some people believe it's not an emotion at all but an experience, like depression and anxiety. (In this context I'll explore it as an emotion, like with depression and anxiety in my earlier posts). Read more about basic emotions here: https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/hide-and-seek/201601/what-are-basic-emotions

Gratitude List

Things I'm grateful for this month:

Presents I received at Christmas
Trying new products from ALDI and Lidl
Beautiful sunsets
Going to the beach- it was cold but I stayed for a bit and took some sunset pics!
Heavy Rain (PS3 game)- re-playing it currently.
Leftover Christmas chocolates and early Easter ones! lol.
New calendar and diary
New Teen Mom UK starting soon

I don't tend to post pictures with these lists but I did for the October Gratitude List, so thought it would be nice to share one of the sunset pics this month:

Sunset on Shoreham Beach.

Letting Go of 2018

It's the end of another year again! 2018 feels like it's gone by quite fast. When it's Christmas I always think, "How is it here again?" lol. I find that once it gets to September, the remaining months of the year seem to go quickly. I started writing this a couple of days ago and it's now New Year's Eve. Last year I wrote a post about letting go of 2017 (doesn't feel that long since I did it!) which you can read here: https://fallingpetalsuk.blogspot.com/2017/12/letting-go-of-2017.html

This year I'm going to do a similar post about letting go of 2018 and getting ready for 2019. :)

If you're interested in numerology, 2018 was an 11/2 universal year, so 2019 is a 3 year. It's said to be a year when our desires will take form and we'll expand more. Read more here: https://www.universallifetools.com/2018/12/2019-universal-3-year-numerology-spiritual-meaning/

My personal year number was a 6 this year, so 2019's will be 7. 6 was about harmony in love and family. I don't know if it was that accurate but I did make some new friends and meet new people this year. 7 is about learning and reflection. I use the book 21st Century Goddess for information abut my year number, but you can find your personal year number here: https://karisamuels.com/personal-year-numerology/

Gratitude List

Things I'm grateful for this month:

Christmas lights and decorations
Chocolate advent calendars- still like to have one!
Getting a Christmas tree for only £12 this year!
Meeting new people at a Meetup event
Fluffy blankets
Sunny days
Yule coming up
Christmas in general

Feeling Your Emotions- Fear and Anxiety (Part 2)

This is the next post in the Feeling Your Emotions series. You can read the introductory post here: https://fallingpetalsuk.blogspot.com/2017/11/feeling-your-emotions-introduction.html

Disclaimer: I'm not a doctor, so if you're having mental/physical issues please seek medical help in addition to reading this. :)

Update 29/8/22: Several of the links have now gone or changed but I've updated where I can and added a couple of new ones. :)

I've previously covered Anger, Sadness and Depression and Fear and Anxiety. As I did with the other posts, fear and anxiety is divided into two parts. Part 1 which I wrote in October, looked at fear and anxiety themselves, the differences and similarities between them. Part 2 will look at feeling better, managing fear (like with sadness it's a normal human emotion, so we won't be able to get rid of it completely) and healing/coping with anxiety. You can read Part 1 here: https://fallingpetalsuk.blogspot.com/2018/10/feeling-your-emotions-fear-and-anxiety.html

Now here is Part 2. While in the middle of writing this I ended up going through an anxious time. I intended to post it last month but never mind.

I'm going to look at fear and anxiety separately but sometimes things written in either section will overlap with the other. As well as looking at it from a psychological viewpoint, I'm also going to look at it from a spiritual perspective. :)


Worry

First I'll take a quick look at worry. So what's the difference between fear and worry? In Part 1 I mentioned how fear is more about a specific threat and anxiety is more of a vague unease. Fear has been defined as an "unpleasant emotion caused by the threat of danger, pain and harm", "an unpleasant, often strong emotion caused by anticipation or awareness of danger" and "a vital response to physical and emotional danger". Worry is when you think (or are afraid) that something bad is going to happen and you keep thinking about it, dwelling on it. Read more here: http://www.differencebetween.net/language/words-language/difference-between-the-words-fear-and-worry/

Gratitude List

Things I'm grateful for this month:

Going to firework displays for Bonfire Night
Going to a Maypole workshop with my belly dance group- although it's more a spring activity, it was still fun!
New slippers!
The Map of Time by Felix J. Palma- currently reading it
Coffee (hot and iced/frappuccino)
Christmas chocolate!
Last of the autumn leaves and colours
Hot chocolate


P.S. I'm currently taking part in Amina Makhdoom's Kindness Challenge which runs for a month (23rd Nov to 22nd Dec). We just started, so if you'd like to join you can read more and sign-up here: http://www.lunchwithcinderella.com/blog-posts/kindness