One of my favorite coaching sessions happens when a client tells me that they feel like there is something wrong. They are bothered about an area of their life (career, love, home), but can’t pinpoint exactly why. All they know is that they feel an uncomfortable emotion. After they narrate their story, there is almost always one common denominator: They’ve been ignoring or pushing away how they’ve been feeling for some time.

What makes us ignore or push away our uncomfortable feelings? Are you someone who tends to dismiss such feelings? Or are you someone who gets curious about how you’re feeling? Many of us dismiss these feelings for many reasons such as thinking that we should not feel that way, judging ourselves for having these feelings, or not trusting how we feel. Although we can push away these feelings for a long time, eventually, they become stronger and louder until we pay attention.

Your feelings are a source of information about you and how you’re living your life. We experience this when we are happy, so it’s also true when we experience the other contrary emotions. When we are genuinely happy, we know our experience is aligned with what we want. And when we feel that something’s not right, it means that our experience is misaligned with something in us. That’s your inner wisdom communicating with you.

When we don’t pay attention to how we feel, we ignore what our inner wisdom is telling us. So how do we pay attention and decipher our feelings better? Here are a few steps.

Notice And Acknowledge How You Feel

The first step is noticing how we feel. Sounds simple enough, right? We can get very busy living our lives and fulfilling the many roles we play. Take a moment in your day to look inward. Close your eyes, take a few deep breaths and connect with how you’re feeling in the moment. Label how you feel and simply acknowledge that you’re feeling that way.

Get Curious About How You Feel

Approach yourself with genuine curiosity and not self-judgement. This is one way you can love yourself. Sometimes, it’s hard to make sense of how we feel so we dismiss, explain or tell ourselves we should not feel that way. Set those thoughts aside. Simply examine yourself: I wonder what makes me feel this way. Be open to uncovering the answer.

Open Your Heart

Your emotions are affected by your thoughts. If you’re someone who’s bogged down by negativity, you need to have a practice that clears your mind. It’s like clearing the mud from your system so you can see better. Open your heart by practicing gratitude everyday. Before you start or end your day, think of three things for which you are grateful. This simple practice opens up your energy and allows you to connect better with inner wisdom.

When you notice and acknowledge your feelings, when you get curious about yourself, and when you open your heart to connect, you participate in the process of developing self-trust. When you trust yourself, you trust how you feel. You will then strengthen the voice of your inner wisdom to guide you as you live the life you want.