So many of us tend to numb our emotions when we feel stress, anxiety, or some other “bad” feeling. I wanna jam on numbing emotions, how to stop, and how all of this relates to food and body. I also did a video on this topic over on my YouTube channel. You can check it out here:
 

 
So, what is numbing your emotions? It’s when you feel a sensation in your body that you don’t like or want to accept, and then you use food to numb that feeling. You may even use other distractions or addictions in place of food, like drugs, sex, etc.
 
If you identify with numbing your emotions, this doesn’t mean that you have an eating disorder. It just means that you don’t yet have the tools to handle emotionality in your body, and the only way that you know how to feel better is through food.
 
It’s important to learn how to self-soothe.
 

 
Self-soothing is when you go internal to soothe any tension or anxiety in the body instead of looking externally, with food or anxiety pills or the like. Sadly, what tends to happen is we feel an emotion that we don’t want to feel, and we go into “I can’t handle these emotions,” mode and quickly turn to an external thing to numb out rather than feeling through the emotions. But here’s the thing:
 
Pain in your body is there for a reason.
 
Pain is your greatest teacher, and when you numb it, you are missing the lesson. If you are experiencing pain or stress, it’s likely that something is out of alignment or that something isn’t right in your life. Instead of suppressing your emotions, you need to feel your them in order to heal.
 
Feel everything.
 
Feel the pain, sadness, or whatever else comes up. When you disconnect with those feelings, you’re going to go into numbing mode. Remember that your body knows exactly how to handle your pain, it’s your mind that thinks you can’t. Give yourself the chance to feel and explore those sticky feelings. Your body will never give you anything that you can’t handle. Removing labels when it comes to emotionality is also helpful. There are no “good” or “bad” emotions, they are just sensation. So remove those labels, trust yourself to feel, and I guarantee you will see some traction when it comes to this work.
 

 
In case you need some help in this department, try my ninja strategy to help with numbing emotions:
 
Meditation!
 
Silence your mind and connect back into your body. This will help you learn the difference between an emotional vs. a physical hunger cues, which means you’ll be less likely to turn to food. Meditation can also bring you back into your body, and help you heal your relationship to food and body, for good.
 
So, comment below and tell me: do you numb out? If so, what’s your biggest trigger that leads you to do so?