Today's gift to you all 🎁
First of all it's my birthday. I've had a lovely day so far and I've had loads of pressies and cards and kisses and hugs, which were pretty lacking in my life until I met my wonderful husband John. For years, I had no idea how to cope with my emotions until I learned this framework, which I'm sharing with you today. It's called PUSH, which is a brilliant way to raise your awareness of how you're handling your emotions. When we push feelings down, there's a cost to storing emotions instead of processing and releasing them. Let me help you understand what happens when we suppress our feelings. The Four Stages of Emotional Suppression P - Pretend & Pack Away 📦 Your nervous system stays on high alert. The unprocessed charge doesn't disappear—it waits. When we tell ourselves "I'm fine" while our body knows otherwise, we create internal conflict that keeps our system activated. U - Unname & Unshare 🤐 The brain can't file what it can't name. Without words or witness, your brain can't label the stress response, leaving it cycling in your system. This unnamed experience becomes harder to process and integrate. S - Store & Somatize 🏠 Chronic stress patterns (sleep disruption, inflammation, blood pressure changes), decision fatigue, and reactivity emerge. Your body becomes the storage unit for unprocessed emotions, manifesting as physical symptoms and tension. H - Harden & Hijack 🚗 Emotions start to hijack choices—relationships strain, boundaries blur, burnout rises, and your sense of self-confidence erodes. The very feelings we tried to avoid begin driving our decisions unconsciously. I am so grateful for Elyce Gordon, who developed this framework. She is a brilliant woman, and if you're on Instagram, she's on there as @thefeelingsexpert So how do you break the Cycle? Recognition is the first step. When we can identify where we are in this cycle, we can begin to interrupt the pattern and choose a different response. This awareness creates space for healing and growth.