How to Sit With Your Feelings

Have you noticed yourself intentionally pushing away thoughts? You may use distractions like scrolling, screens, overworking, shopping, or numbing through food or substances to avoid certain feelings.

If you can relate, this is called experiential avoidance. Experiential avoidance is something that many people deal with, and often, it’s a means to avoid sitting with your feelings.

Sitting with your feelings means noticing and staying present with an emotion without acting on the urge to escape it. It’s not wallowing, suppressing, or trying to change the emotion; it’s simply feeling the emotion in the moment.

Sitting with your feelings matters because it keeps you from avoiding them. Maybe you think that avoiding thoughts or feelings is beneficial, but chronic experiential avoidance often increases your anxiety over the long term, even if you may feel relief in the moment.

Avoiding thoughts and feelings also signals to the mind that the “threat” (uncomfortable feeling) is real and reinforces the anxiety. It also shrinks your world as you avoid more things or experiences that trigger these uncomfortable thoughts, feelings, and sensations.

If you’ve noticed yourself avoiding thoughts or feelings lately, now is the time to sit with your feelings. Here are some skills to get you started:

Pause and notice when an emotion comes up.

You may notice physical sensations or changes in thinking and behavior that indicate a certain emotion is coming up for you.

Name it.

Take a moment to identify the emotion. Is it sadness? Joy? Fear? Jealousy?

Locate it in your body.

Where do you feel this emotion? Is there tension in your shoulders? Is your heart racing? Does your head hurt? Does it feel like there’s a pit in your stomach?

Take a deep breath and make some space for the emotion.

Don’t judge yourself for feeling a certain way. This feeling won’t last forever. Accept the emotion for what it is, and know that it’s okay to feel this way. Instead of trying to push the feeling away, imagine creating physical space within yourself for it to simply sit.

Let your thoughts pass without accepting them as fact.

There’s no need to accept or argue with your thoughts right now. Observe them by thinking, “I notice I am having a thought about…”

Practice self-compassionate curiosity about your feelings.

Speak to yourself and treat yourself with the same compassion you would a close friend. Ask yourself some non-judgmental questions:

• What is the intensity of this emotion?

• Am I reacting to something?

• What might this feeling be trying to tell me?

Decide what you would like to do next.

Do you want to respond to the emotion, or let it go? Sometimes, our emotions communicate unmet needs or a boundary being crossed. If so, we can take action to address them.

When you allow yourself to sit with an emotion, it tends to pass much faster. Because you aren’t actively fighting or feeding the feeling, the emotional peak moves through you far more quickly than if you were to avoid it. Over time, this practice builds your capacity to tolerate discomfort and gradually softens knee-jerk reactivity. Reducing that automatic reaction protects you from the secondary distress that often comes from fighting your own internal experience.

Practicing this approach is a powerful way to cultivate self-trust. When we step away from avoidance as a primary coping strategy, we break the cycle of anxiety and create room for a more grounded, present life. 

That said, turning toward difficult emotions isn't always easy, and it can bring up deeper, painful layers. If you try these steps and feel that additional support would be helpful, please know you don't have to navigate this alone. You can learn more about my counseling services here.

My blog posts are not a replacement for therapy, and the information provided does not constitute the formation of a therapist-patient relationship. The information in my blog posts is general information for educational purposes only and is not intended to be therapy or psychological advice. If you are a current or former client, please remember that your interactions with my blog may jeopardize your confidentiality. Please consult your physician or mental health provider regarding advice or support for your health and well-being.

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