What when you pick up on other people’s anxiety?

Last week, I was asked how to put your mind at ease, especially when picking up on other people’s feelings? When staying at home in your own bubble it can feel quite comfortable. But when you go out to the supermarket, you might feel different. Picking up on other people’s discomfort, stress and anxiety is quite common.

Maybe you are aware of this, maybe not. When it happens, you can ask yourself, are these feelings my own? Or am I picking them up from others?


RESTORING YOUR BALANCE

Sometimes, people feel avoiding is best, when picking up on other people’s feelings in public places. However, that can be quite restricting to ourselves. We simply cannot always avoid situations and there are more constructive ways to deal with it.

Others feel they need to protect themselves by visualizing energy barriers. However, in my experience, this does not really help to solve the problem. You will need to keep making these barriers every time you go to a public place. When we protect ourselves like this and have underlying fear and anxiety that we might pick up on other people’s feelings, then the problem might get worse instead.

It is when we learn how to develop a natural and relaxed state, that we can re-balance ourselves and become calmer.


GAINING CLARITY

Apart from picking up on other people’s feelings, it can also be that other people’s feelings have triggered a fear or worry inside of you that you were not aware of at the time. Hence, noticing this, you can ask yourself:

  • What am I exactly feeling?
  • Is this feeling my own or did I pick it up?
  • Does this feeling trigger a deeper pattern inside of me?

When you gain clarity about what is going on for you, then it is much easier to deal with it.


CONNECT WITH YOUR BODY

If the feeling is not yours, tell yourself: “this is not mine, I do not need to hold on to this.” Take a moment to connect with your body, your breath, your heart. Breathe into your heart. See if you can feel trust inside. It might help to think of the word trust and repeat it, while you follow your breath.

If the feeling does not leave you, then it might be that it triggered your own fear, worry or anxiety. This is a good opportunity to look at that. We cannot become aware of the patterns behind our feelings if they never get triggered. So, take this opportunity to sit down with it, write about it in your journal or talk about it with a friend.

Then ask yourself: how do I want to respond instead? Write that down too.

Sometimes, when we have written down what is going on inside ourselves and how we want to respond instead, the pattern shifts. However, the more stubborn patterns need more work to change.


PATTERNS OF THE CONSCIOUSNESS

One thing to note here is that our consciousness has patterns to function well. We develop these patterns from early on in life, and most of them are formed by the age of three. Because these patterns have become fully automatic and we have had them for so long, they can be stubborn and hard to transform.


DEVELOPING YOUR HEART QUALITIES

Therefore, in Yuan Qigong, there are two special methods for transforming patterns. The first one is ‘The Seventh Method’, that helps us work on our heart and grow our heart qualities. These are trust, openness and acceptance, love, gratitude, and respect. When developing these qualities, we start to get less triggered. This has many reasons. One of them is that when you trust yourself, others, and life more, other people’s feelings overwhelm and influence you less likely. When we are open and more accepting, then we might notice other people’s feelings and be able to let them go. Because we trust what is happening, we can empathize with the other person and hence not take their feelings on board. Instead we can let go.


TRANSFORMING PATTERNS

The second method to help with patterns is ‘The Eight Method’. This is a method that deals with the patterns of the consciousness directly. It helps you to see the manifestations and underlying causes of your patterns, so that you gain a lot more clarity about yourself. Subsequently it helps you to transform and clear your patterns.

These two methods, together with developing a calm and natural state, help tremendously in dealing with feeling other people’s anxiety and fear. You can easier discern what is theirs and what is your own. When you notice you feel the fear of others, you will be able to go back to a calm and balanced state again. And you will be able to find underlying patterns within yourself that make you hold on to certain feelings from others or that become triggered by them.

This way, you are not on the receiving end of how others feel any longer. And when you still pick them up, simply saying “that is not mine”, might now be enough to shake the feelings and put your mind at ease again.

Learn the methods of  REN XUE and Yuan Qigong

I can imagine, you would like to learn the Seventh and Eight Methods after reading this blog. If you have never done Yuan Qigong, then join my free online Introduction workshop. In this workshop you will learn how to create a calm and relaxed state. You will ‘go home’ with effective and practical tools to re-balance yourself wherever you are.

After that, you can join my upcoming courses of the Seventh and Eight Methods, as well as the course teaching the First and Second Methods. For more information see workshops and classes

To register leave me a message in the contact form or here below in the comment box.

Looking forward to seeing you there!

With love and gratitude,

Aiyanna Sophie

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