Every time I learn a new song on the guitar, there is an impulse to want to play something that I already know. This feeling is always there—the impulse to move away from the difficulty. It is the same with emotional work. There is an impulse to push away the uncomfortable feeling. The grief, the anger, the shame—that which is painful.
The first year of emotional work is the hardest. You have to learn how to be with uncomfortable emotions. You have to learn how to contain it. You are not really integrating all of your emotional baggage. Rather, you’re beginning to learn how to not run from it.