In my last blog post here, I spoke about why self-care is not just a plaster effect, and how there was a whole other world of self-care that involves trying to understand ourselves, why we are the way we are, and why we have certain thoughts, emotions, and insecurities in different situations. Today I’ll be sharing 4 ways that I process my emotions to know myself better, in the hope that you might benefit from them too. 😊
1. Consuming media
From books, to podcasts, to YouTube videos, it is incredible how much information you can find without even needing to leave your bed! There are honestly SO many neverending holes you could get into from one simple google or YouTube search. Google and YouTube have now become my best friends when I’m in need of an answer to literally anything, from how to keep my plant alive, to why I can’t stop getting triggered by this one thing.
I think Instagram can be a good supplement if you follow the right people, but I wouldn’t really recommend Instagram as a primary source of learning about these kinds of topics as it doesn’t really give you detailed enough explanations like a YouTube video, book, or podcast might.
Here are some of my favourite Youtube channels and podcasts (I’ve tried to include a range so you don’t need to watch/listen to them all, but try to find a couple that you can really resonate with and stick with them)!
YouTube Channels (linked):
- Matt D’Avella
- Nathaniel Drew
- Ben Jolliffe
- George Thompson
- Lavendaire
- Lana Blakely
- Anna Akana
- Jasmine Lipska
Podcasts:
- Kwik Brain by Jim Kwik
- The School of Greatness by Lewis Howes
- On Purpose by Jay Shetty
- The Art of Charm
- Impact Theory with Tom Bilyeu
- Women of Impact with Lisa Bilyeu
- The Jordan B. Peterson Podcast
- The Lavendaire Lifestyle
- What’s This Tao All About?
2. Journaling
I talk about this a lot on my Instagram, but processing my thoughts onto paper really enables me to understand and know myself so much better than any other method. You don’t have to be an amazing writer to do this and it might even seem trivial to some, but the act of consciously having to organise your thoughts into something that makes sense onto paper automatically makes you understand your thoughts with much more clarity.
There are plenty of journaling prompts out there, but to be honest if you’re just starting out, all you need to do is just write. You don’t need to worry about it making perfect sense, but just write down whatever is on your mind. As I like to say, it is like brain dumping your thoughts onto paper. Once you start to understand your mind more, then you can introduce more specific journaling prompts if that’s something you would like to build up to.
3. Meditation
Meditation is something that I believe still holds some negative connotations that stop people from even trying it out. However, there is so much fascinating science behind why it works, so maybe I’ll write a blog post about that one day. 😉
Anyway, meditation allows our mind to be still, and when our mind is still, we can observe what thoughts come to the surface. The key here is to simply observe rather than judge, avoid, or try to change these thoughts. It is almost as if we are standing on the side of a road, watching the cars (i.e. our thoughts) go by. Some will move faster than others, and some may be noisier than others, but that’s okay. We are just watching them go by for now.
Once we’ve allowed our thoughts to come to the surface and acknowledged them as they are, we can then ask questions to dig deeper into why we might be feeling a certain way and where it may be stemming from. After a meditation is also where journaling might come in handy too. We can document what thoughts came up, and ask ourselves further questions to seek deeper understanding.
4. Talking to others
Lastly, talking to others is probably something that I do the least, and that I’m still learning to try to be more comfortable with. It’s something that I would usually do after I’ve done the above as I generally prefer to process my emotions and understand what I’m going through myself first before I can talk to someone else about it. However, I know some people who like to talk it out straight away, then only look to process it deeper by themselves. It’s really just about finding what works for you, but remember that talking it out is not enough. To see real change, you need to do the inner self-work too.
I hope that you have found this useful and might consider trying a couple of these out to know yourself a little better. If you do end up trying any of these, please do let me know how it goes! You can give me a message on Instagram here. 😊
Fee Teng Liew 