cc2011:21 Right and Left sides

i am preparing for a self-exploration project and i am using Visual Journaling as my tool. I plan to post pics so ~ i'd like to say "stay tuned" but look at how i have followed through in the last couple of months with this blogging thing.. it really is much harder than what it looks :)

i'd like to share with you something that really gives me a new understanding of why in therapy i will sit for sessions exploring what it is that is truly transpiring in regards to our "feeling" about something.. rather than ask how do you feel and then move on.. as if whatever it is that i or others say is a distilled truth.

let me ~ hopefully ~ explain.

our brain had two sides, right and left. simplified ~ right is our emotion and left is our logic.

i have just learned that our right side doesn't discern "right from wrong" in terms of judgement, but rather just a general good and bad feeling. the bad feeling i compare to the gut feeling of something isn't quite right.

the left on the other hand is the judgement ~ the interpretation, the verbal translation. when i am telling you how i feel it is actually my left brain taking its best attempt towards preforming an inventory on the really abstract going's on of the right side.

have you ever had that moment when ... someone is asking ~ how it is that you are feeling about something, you say it but the moment it leaves your mouth there is this internal response of 'no, that's not it either ~ but i can't really put my finger on it, so - yea, i guess that's it."

i have felt at times ~ hookey or silly about really leading in session, stepping all around the topic just to more fully understand the true reflection. all the while trying to seem . . . in the flow ~ i guess. ahhh.. as the left side fails me :)

i have always had a hard time helping someone identify feelings, or at least label their feelings as sad, glad, or mad. at some intuitive level i just knew it was more. i mean, if 10 of us stood in line ~ 10 of us would represent sad in 10 unique ways.

i think ~ i know ~ deep down ♥ when we are able to discover and know ourselves more we will become more compassionate with self and others.

so... all of us could benefit from a exploration of our emotions. why? because how easy would it have been growing up to have a feeling inside labeled as angry, but really it was fear, frustration or hurt?

an illustration ~ perhaps we can allow ourselves to become more open to the many shades of ourselves ~ the shades of our wisdom just waiting to be poured out ♥

visual journaling is a technique that allows the right side to be placed on paper before the left side gather's intel. i am a believer of bringing things into the light so that an examination ~ an exploration can take place.