In everyone's life, there are incidents that cause us pain. These painful incidents can keep us tied up in resentments, anger, or grief. According to Peter Levine, the body has its own natural way of allowing such sentiments to be process, through the emotions that they create.
Letting go of incidents is not easy. Memories stimulate feelings, and recalling them can increase the distress of the event. How do we process them? Not by shutting down the emotions, blocking them, or ignoring them. We can only release the memory of the incident by allowing ourselves to experience the emotions they evoke, until they are gone.
Often in an EMDR session, we will concentrate on the emotions that come up with certain memories. Then we find where those emotions are felt in the body. It can be a stiff neck, an aching head or jaw, or knots in the stomach. Once the area has been identified, we process that area by allowing ourselves to feel that stiff heck, or aching jaw, or knot in the stomach, and stay with it while using the bi-lateral stimulation, until the feeling dissipates. This is the body's nature way of dealing with emotions.
If you have a distressing memory, I encourage you to examine your physical being until you discover where the emotions are lodged in the body. Then, using the butterfly tap, allow yourself the time and space to just feel that space until the body has dissipates that feeling.
I hope this technique will help you in dealing better with painful memories
