Lost in Your Emotional Jungle?

Emotional Conditioning Is Like A Dark Jungle

We all have emotional conditioning from childhood that creates a jungle of emotional reactions we must navigate every day. Some seem to be full of twisted vines with inch-long thorns! What is your jungle like?  Beautiful flowering vines?  Or have you tied your vines into nice, orderly bunches so they’re not as noticeable.

Do people seem to get snarled in your vines and trip over them?  Do you notice others and maybe even yourself walking away bleeding from the thorns?  Maybe it’s your spouse, your kids or the people at work.

You may be afraid of what might be hiding behind the thorny vines on your path, or you may have become so used to them that you don’t feel it necessary to clear them out of the way.

Let me assure you, they are affecting your life!

Our jungles can bring us a false sense of security. We may have become comfortable living in the shade and darkness they provide. We have become like nocturnal animals.

The Vines Create An Endless List Of Problems?

Each vine has a unique growth habit, some of them starting high and away where we hardly see them until they grow downward and end up firmly rooted, obstructing the path forward. Other vines grow upward from deep within, wrapping themselves around us, slowly consuming our life force like a host tree.  

21 Problems Created By Jungle Vines:

1.     Contribute to depression. 

2.     Replay the anger of past events in the form of bitterness or disappointment. 

3.     Abundant fertilizer for worry and anxiety.

4.     Ignore our “gut feeling,” our internal compass is broken.

5.     Doubt blocks us from doing what we know we need to do.

6.     Feel separate from others causing loneliness.

7.     Lots of conflict in our relationships.

8.     Feelings of neediness.

9.     Don’t feel worthy, need recognition to feel valued.

10.   Frustrated or angry when people don’t meet our expectations.

11.   Keep quiet, don’t express our thoughts.

12.   Tolerate toxic behavior, among other issues.

13.   Constantly give to others to make them happy; we want love.

14.   Fear of the unknown, don’t make changes.

15.   Control situations to feel safe.

16.   Cling on to unfulfilling relationships.

17.   Make others wrong and get angry in order to move forward.

18.   Poor listeners.

19.   Need to have things our own way.

20.   Overreact to situations.

21.   We’re difficult to deal with.

Anything you can add to this list?

The bottom line is these behaviors damage relationships, makes life difficult and we don’t feel as happy as we could. 

My colleague, Jacque shares, "The vines in my jungle were prolific and thorny! I appeared to be a very tough and independent woman.  I protected the vulnerable part of myself that didn’t feel good enough and lacked confidence. As the vines in my jungle grew denser, the darker it was on the jungle floor and the more difficult my life felt."

Click Here to read the full white paper onemotional problems.

Where Did The Jungle Come From?

Understand the fact that your jungle is not your fault, or anybody’s for that matter. 

It helps to understand where the vines got started in the first place.

Emotional conditioning begins even before we are born and rapidly develops during the first four years of childhood when the neural connections in the brain are developing most actively. What emotionally impacts us during this stage of our early development creates the foundation for our adult behavioral patterns, including feelings, thoughts and actions.

As newborns, we are suddenly exposed to a foreign and cold world with new sights, sounds, and sensations. Any number of events can frighten us as children causing us to be overwhelmed. 

When we experience emotional trauma, two things occurr: a mental process and a physical process. An interactive dynamic occurs between the body and the brain, with memories being stored in the brain and energy being stored in the cells of the body. Painful trauma is recorded and gets stuck in the mind and body at whatever age the trauma occurred.  It doesn’t grow up!  Additional life traumas cause more pain, accelerating the growth of our emotional jungle.  

5 Reasons the Emotional Jungle Is So Hard To Get Rid Of?

1.       We believe time heals all and hence do nothing.

2.       Traditional methods typically only target the emotions recorded by our brain.

3.       We don’t know how to root out the emotions stored in our body’s cells.

4.       We are embarrassed to talk about emotions and feelings.

5.       We fear that people will think we are weak.

We are taught how to read, write, and do arithmetic in school, but we are not taught about emotions and feelings. Most people are very uncomfortable talking about emotions. Yet emotions and feelings are just another source of information, like thinking. Our objective is not to eliminate our feelings, but to stay centered and respond appropriately to a given situation. To reach this point takes practice.

Counseling and coaching are not enough.  They use a machete to cut back the vines.  The roots remain to re-grow another day.  Yes you will feel much better. But, when future life challenges provoke you, it is like throwing fertilizer and water on the vines.  Once again your vines become prolific shutting out the light. 

You have a choice. You’re an adult now; you can keep the jungle or cut down the vines and eradicate the roots.  It’s all up to you.

The Emotional Hot Button Removal techniques are used to dig out the roots. (A future white paper.) 

What Is Possible When You Clear Your Jungle?

When we dissociate from our body to avoid sensing undesirable feelings, we can’t fully sense feelings from desirable emotions either. As a result we miss out on the full impact of love and joy, and on experiencing the more elusive feelings of tenderness, ecstasy, and pleasure.

Our objective is to respond appropriately to a given situation eliminating our sense of struggle and life being difficult. Life can be magical and you can define what that is for you.  Here are some of the benefits experienced

9 Benefits of Removing the Vines  

1.      No longer living in fear. 

2.       Mostly being grounded and centered, and responding appropriately.

3.       Using  intuition as a compass to guide life choices towards what will bring  the greatest sense of joy.

4.       Virtually no stress. Hopefully this helps to avoid disease and illness to live a long life.  

5.       Clients have healed long-term difficult family relationships.

6.       Clients have gotten back together with a spouse after separating and want to start over to do the relationship differently. We don’t have to change our spouse, we can just change us.

7.       Couples have been able to use conflict to root out their vines and have a better relationship.

8.       Managers have removed doubt and the fear of failure to feel strong, capable and confident allowing them to work with clarity and focus. They get more done in less time and work feels easier.

9.       More joy, happiness, and love in our life.

One of our workshop participants, Albert, who is sixty years old, called early one morning to say he had just resolved some big energy of dread in his abdomen that he had woken up with every morning for almost as long as he can remember. With absolute glee in his voice, Albert said, “I can tell, I am finally getting my life back.”

Isn’t that what we really want, to live our lives fully and have more good feelings?

What do you want more of in your life?

What would be possible for you if you removed the roots of your vines?

Click Here to read the full white paper onemotional conditioning.


Article contributed by Jacque Small of YourDivineDivorce.com