What I have learned that helps is to have a “Default Thought” when we feel ourselves begin to slide emotionally. A default thought is a thought we can  immediately go to when something causes us to slide out of balance emotionally.

It can be a place in the past, present, future or even a made up place. We imagine that place when anything throws us emotionally. It will help us to disassociate from the situation causing us stress and bring us back to balance.

Buddism teaches us that when something happens in our experience, we need not let it “hook us,” to pull us in, to get lost in it feeling like we can’t get out.  When it “hooks us,” we begin to slide down the emotional scale, drowning with the emotion. We then reach for something to pull us out like food, alcohol, tv to numb our pain. We can accomplish the same relief in a positive way when we pull in our default thought.

Research has shown that a human emotion lasts only 1.5 minutes and it’s released. If we are feeling anything after 1.5 minutes, we are choosing to hold it unto ourselves.

Many people ask me how to let go of thoughts or emotions that are painful. This is one way to do this. It’s not as much about us letting them go or pushing them away it’s about changing our minds and focusing on something else. Then our distressing thought fades.

I have a friend who works as a teacher in a very rough inner city high school with gangs and lots of daily fighting. It is extremely difficult for my friend to pull herself out of bed and go to school everyday as every day is a challenge. I told her she only has 2 more months left but those 2 months feel like 10 years to her. I asked her if there was ever a time this year when she had a rewarding experience, one that made her smile and made her feel really great inside. She said yes, however there were just a few. I asked her to to focus on just one experience and how great it made her feel and when her thoughts guided her down a path of hating her job and couldn’t bare the thought of another day etc. I told her to force herself to think of that one experience that made her feel good (her new default thought). By doing this, the vibration of her being will shift into another emotional place, a new, balanced, peaceful and maybe even happy place.

Spend some time finding your default thought. It could be anything that evokes a feeling of peace, joy and/or happiness. It could be the day you met your true love, the birth of your child, a favorite place, a spot in nature, the ocean, a beautiful field of flowers, a tree where you used to sit under as a kid, laying in your bed. It could be anything.

After you find your default thought, practice “going there” even when you are not feeling emotionally out of balance. Then when you feel yourself slip and need to regain balance, quickly pull up your default thought. Close your eyes and be in your default thought. Spend as much time as you need in that thought. Tune into your body and notice if there is any tension left. If there is, sit longer, if not then continue on with your day. It will change your emotional state to that of more peace. Who doesn’t want to live with that?

This is a beautiful excerpt from the book Nourishing Traditions that reminds us the importance of being present in performing every daily task, even preparing our meals.

“If woman could see the sparks of light going forth from her fingertips when she is cooking and the substance of light that goes into the food she handles, she would be amazed to see how much of herself she charges into the meals that she prepares for her family and friends.

It is one of the most important and least understood activities of life-that the radiation and feeling that go into the preparation of food affect everyone who partakes of it, and this activity should be unhurried, peaceful and happy.  It would be better that an individual did not eat at all than to eat food that has been prepared under a feeling of anger, resentment, depression or an outward pressure, because the substance of the lifestream performing the service flows into that food and is eaten and actually becomes part of the energy of the receiver.  That is why the advanced spiritual teachers of the East never eat food prepared by anyone other than their own chelas.  Conversely, if the one preparing the food is the only one in the household who is spiritually advanced and an active charge of happiness, purity and peace pours forth into the food from him, this pours forth into the other members and blesses them.  I might say that there are more ways than one of allowing the Spirit of God to enter the flesh of man.”  (Maha Chohan Electrons)

When we get tripped up and fall into a bad day one idea to get us back into balance is food. Before we go on an eating binge, hang on, there are certain types of foods to help us back to happiness.

Let’s take a look at the nuts and bolts behind this theory. There are two ideas to examine:

1.  Negative thoughts and emotions carry an energetic vibration that is very low (feels heavy), versus happy thoughts and emotions which carry a much higher vibration (feels lighter).

2. The law of attraction teaches us that “like attracts like.”

So we can conclude that when we are feeling down, we crave something that has a similar vibrational match to our mood, like the vibration of candy bars, potato chips, ice cream or something similar.

One solution to help lift us out of our sadness is to choose foods with a higher vibration. If we are eating foods with a higher vibration then (because of law of attraction) we could begin to feel better.

Foods with the highest vibration are “live” (or uncooked) like raw fruits and vegetables.

Sometimes when we feel the need to be comforted, an alternative choice are foods that are warm like soups, stews or steamed vegetables. These foods are cooked but still hold a higher vibration (because of the vegetables) than fried or sugary sweets.

So the next time you feel you need an emotional boost, eat your fruits and veggies. They help to your energy to vibrate higher, in your heart, the same place happiness resides.