How to feel your feelings so they don’t sabotage your sleep

Experiencing emotions is part of being human. But we can have trouble feeling emotions, especially ones that society has told us are bad such as feeling sad or angry. And this can affect our sleep. 

In this blog post, I share why you want to feel your feelings, how to feel your feelings in only 10 minutes with 4 simple steps, and I introduce you to a tool called the 5 minute rule to help move past negative emotions quickly.

Let’s dive in!

Why you want to feel your feelings

When you try to ignore or suppress your feelings, they don’t go away. They get stuck in your body and cause unhealthy patterns and cycles that can be hard to break. They can also bottle up and come out when you don’t want them to. 

As an example, if your husband doesn’t get you anything for Valentine’s day, and you don’t tell him you’re mad, your anger may come out days later when he doesn’t take out the trash. Your husband thinks you’re mad about the trash, when you’re actually mad about him not getting you anything for Valentine’s day a few days prior. In this example, it’s not about the trash. It’s about Valentine’s day and feeling uncared for. 

Ignoring your feelings creates constant stress that breaks down your body and affects your sleep. 

It may seem like your feelings will last forever, but if you take the time to feel and process them, they actually go away pretty quickly. It’s uncomfortable to feel them but it will help you process them and move on so they don’t keep affecting you months and years later.

How to feel your feelings in only 10 minutes with 4 simple steps

Here’s a quick 4 step process that will help you feel your feelings, so you can move on with your day and sleep well at night. 

1. Identify the emotion. Use the feelings wheel, which you can Google and find, to name what emotion you’re feeling. Then, identify what triggered it. 

2. Remind yourself that feelings are normal. Validate what emotions are coming up for you by identifying it, welcoming it, and sitting with it. Do this without judging it, without wanting it to change, and without thinking of a way to fix it. Remind yourself that it is safe to feel. 

One way to do this is by using “I” statements like “I feel ___ (insert emotion), it’s okay that I feel (insert emotion), I am allowed to feel ___”. 

Another way to validate emotions is to write the emotion you’re experiencing in a letter. What would you say to guilt? What would you say to resistance? How do these feelings actually benefit you? Write it down. 

3. Sit with your feeling for 10-15 minutes. Ask yourself, “Where is this feeling in my body?” “Where am I holding tension?” “What does it look like?” “What color is it?” “How does this process feel?” 

If you find yourself thinking, “I just don’t want to feel that.” or “how do I even do this?” sit with that. That is how you’re feeling. 

Go toward the thing that is blocking or frustrating you. Acknowledge it, validate it, and sit with it. 

4. Express your emotions. Use these simple activities to feel your emotions. 

-Journal

-Dance or move your body
-Listen to music you enjoyed as a child
-Punch a pillow
-Cry
-Take a long shower or bath
-Go for a walk
-Talk to the emotion
-Create art
-Talk with a safe, compassionate person
-Stretch
-Write affirmations

Learning how to feel your feelings takes practice so be gentle with yourself. Remember that emotions aren’t permanent and that there is no “bad” emotion.

The 5 Minute Rule

Another tool I find helpful is the 5 minute rule. I learned this from Hal Elrod in his book The Miracle Morning. 

When something happens that upsets you (someone cancels an appointment, you’re stuck in traffic, it’s going to rain on your wedding day, etc.), set a timer for 5 minutes. 

During that time, allow yourself to feel all the frustration, anger, or disappointment. Stomp, yell, kick, curse and get it all out until the timer goes off. Then move on. Hal always says, “can’t change it” at the end of the 5 minutes.

When you first start doing this, it will take the whole 5 minutes to get everything out. Over time, you’ll get over it quicker and quicker until you may only need 5 seconds to get over these things. (If you find the feeling keeps coming back, then you want to take the time to feel your feelings as described above.)

How to get 7-9 hours of quality sleep every night

In the Complete Sleep Solution program, we use functional lab testing to find the imbalances in your body that are sabotaging your sleep. 

And, as you can see from my client Jamie’s post below, we also help with mental stress so it doesn’t keep you awake. Jamie said:

“And having some hard moments I appreciated Tina speaking truth with love and reminded me of all the good results I was seeing and just helping me change my perspective. Which really helped. Also I didn’t feel alone, I felt like I could reach out and someone would get back to me. Also I felt like the videos and Tina giving me the tools to get through hard days and tools on how to get through it whether it’s practical or mental tools.”

It’s a body and mind approach that will make sure you get 7+ hours of uninterrupted sleep in 6 months or less. 

You don’t have to see a therapist for the mental part and a health practitioner for the physical part. You can get support for both in the Complete Sleep Solution program from a coach who understands what it’s like to not be able to sleep. 

Learn more about the Complete Sleep Solution program.