The One Thing Most People Are Unwilling to Feel

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"When we come into the present, we begin to feel the life around us again, but we also encounter whatever we have been avoiding. We must have the courage to face whatever is present – our pain, our desires, our grief, our loss, our secret hopes our love – everything that moves us most deeply."

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Jack Kornfield

A few days ago, a friend of mine came to stay with us. He’s a Lama I first met in Nepal, where he lives in the monastery of my teacher, Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche.

That morning, we were sitting at the kitchen table at my house in Ubud, Bali. Coffee in our hands. Morning sounds of the village in the background.

And we found ourselves talking about something that feels very central to this whole path.

That a key aspect of liberation is not avoiding our feelings.

It’s our ability to be with them.

When Positivity Becomes a Distraction From What’s Real

In many spiritual spaces, something interesting happens.

Practices that are meant to bring us closer to truth start being used to move away from it.

Instead of feeling what’s here, we try to rise above it.

Stay positive.

Stay in high vibration.

Stay in the light.

And slowly, maybe without even noticing it, certain emotions become unwelcome.

Anger.

Jealousy.

Fear.

Greed.

They’re seen as “less spiritual.”

As something we shouldn’t feel if we’re truly on the path.

This is what’s often called spiritual bypassing.

And it’s more common than we think.

Especially in spiritual hubs like Ubud, I see this a lot.

But it can happen anywhere. Also inside our own practice.

Where the real work begins

If we’re honest, these challenging emotions are exactly where the real work begins.

Not in the moments where everything feels calm and open.

But in the moments where something inside us tightens.

Where we feel triggered.

Uncomfortable.

Ashamed.

Learning how to be with that.

Without escaping.

Without suppressing.

Without pretending it’s not there.

That’s the practice.

Mindfulness is only half of it

Mindfulness is one of the most powerful tools I know for this.

At its core, it’s very simple: Paying attention to what’s here, moment to moment, without judgment.

Feeling the body.

Noticing the thoughts.

Being present with the emotions as they arise.

But in my experience, mindfulness alone isn’t enough.

Because when difficult emotions come up, something else often happens.

We turn against ourselves.

We judge what we feel and we think it shouldn’t be there.

And that creates another layer of suffering.

The second wing: compassion

This is where compassion comes in.

What Tara Brach calls the second wing of Radical Acceptance.

If mindfulness allows us to stay present, compassion allows us to be kind to ourselves when we most need it.

Kind towards the Part of us that feels anxious.

Kind towards the Part that feels angry.

Kind towards the Part that would rather not feel any of this at all.

Together, mindfulness and compassion create something powerful.

The ability to be with our experience without getting lost in it and without pushing it away.

A larger container

Over time, something begins to shift: There’s more space.

It’s as if the container in which our experience happens becomes larger.

The same emotions might still arise.

But they don’t feel as overwhelming.

We’re able to stay with them a little longer and let them move through us.

And we also begin to see something very simple, but very profound: Everything changes.

Every sensation, every thought, every emotion.

They arise, stay for a while and then pass.

And with that, the constant effort to fight our experience, to control it, to make it different, begins to soften.

What this freedom feels like

From here, something like equanimity begins to emerge.

Not as a concept but as a lived experience.

We’re still human.

We still feel everything.

Sometimes even more deeply than before.

But we’re no longer overwhelmed in the same way.

We can let things move through us.

Without holding on.

Without pushing away.

And in that there is a quiet kind of freedom.

Why this matters now more than ever

Especially in times like these, where there is a lot going on in the world, this becomes a profound inner resource.

Something we can rely on when life becomes very challenging.

The ability to stay present.

To stay open.

To stay with what’s here.

Even when it’s uncomfortable.