Many folks I see have come in with an subtle way of diverting their energy that may surprise you – it’s a form of count your blessings, but instead of it being a way to express gratitude it turns into a way of shutting down their emotions often about a painful experience.

Here’s an example; my family member has X diagnosis and now I am responsible for all these new things…but at least we have a house; at least we are not living in a war zone; at least I can drink the water; I need to be grateful for what I have. I strongly believe gratitude is a helpful and healing practice, but counting your blessings as a way to divert or suppress energy is not. Counting your blessings often serves as a shut off valve to how you actually are feeling about the situation. Perhaps you are actually resentful about your new responsibilities or sad or scared about the situation or maybe all of the above. By holding the space to experience all these feelings, they can dissipate and give you more energy to negotiate this new and different terrain. When we suppress or divert our feelings it can be a way of spiritual bypass. We also do this when we say here’s how I’m going to handle the situation and don’t ever check in on how we feel about it. From an energetic perspective here’s what that looks like; energy gets stuck in certain spots of the body, often stomach or throat area from not being authentic (3rd chakra) and not speaking your truth (5th chakra). It also leaves us carrying around the weight of congested energy, which is like carrying around a heavy purse of energy we can’t access.

So what do you do when you find yourself cutting yourself off with your blessing countdown? Pause. See if you can speak out loud to someone else or even just out loud to yourself how you are feeling about something / someone before rushing into your blessing around breathing. This is not about getting swamped by your emotions, but it is about airing them.