DEBBIE WILLIAMS's Podcast
DEBBIE WILLIAMS's Podcast
Decoding the Body - Emotions
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This weeks guest is Ashley Valliere, a Personal Fitness Trainer, Massage Therapist and is now completing her Bodynamic Muscular Psychotherapy program. Along her journey she noticed some peculiar things with her clients over the years, most notably emotional outbursts in sessions, she also took a special interest in people’s posture and body language. She specialises in decoding the body, learning how to navigate how it communicates and emotional intelligence.
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Welcome to Storytelling. This guest worked as a personal fitness trainer, a massage therapist, and is now complete in her body namic muscular psychotherapy programme. Along her journey, she noticed some peculiar things with her clients over the years, most notably emotional outburst possessions. She also took a special interest in people's posture and body language. She specialises in decoding the body, learning how to navigate how it communicates, and emotional intelligence. Please welcome Ashley Valier. Hello, Ashley, and welcome to the podcast. Oh, thank you so much for having me. Ashley, how do emotions affect our body?
SPEAKER_01First, we have to talk about what emotions are, and they are chemical reactions in the body. They can be brought on by feelings, they can be brought on by events, environments, like kind of where we are. Feelings are kind of stories that we make up in our head to explain the emotion that we're feeling. So to try and understand why we're feeling a certain way, we make up stories for it. And the stories are based on previous events, whether they're conscious or unconscious, we kind of go through them. And so that's the super cool notes of emotions. And we have seven main emotions we experience that are universal. And each of these seven universal emotions has sensations, and so that's what you feel in your body, as well as instinct. And that's when the emotion becomes so big that it puts you in an instinct mode. So for example, the emotion of sadness, you can just be sad. And then that feeling of sadness might be a little heavy, a little cold, you'd be feeling low. But the instinct side of that would be more of depression.
SPEAKER_00So that feeling of sadness that we feel when you say that we instinctively relate to that emotion, is that what you mean?
SPEAKER_01Well, if we're in that emotion for too long. Yeah. Being sad is an absolutely perfect emotion to experience. And especially in context. Let's say somebody really close to you just passes away. Well, it makes sense that you're sad. So it's okay to feel them, but it's when it goes for a really long time unchecked, that's when we kind of fall into instinct.
SPEAKER_00What can we do when we feel ourselves going from that emotion to that instinct mode where we may be feeling a bit sad or depressed for longer than usual?
SPEAKER_01Oh, the best thing that you can do for any of the emotions really is just have community around you of some sort. And community doesn't have to be a hundred people, it can be one or two just kind of closer people, but just have those people in your life that you check in on and they kind of check in on you. So having contact and connection is like the number one thing.
SPEAKER_00So what are the seven main emotions that we experience?
SPEAKER_01So we have sadness as discussed there, we have disgust, fear, joy, shame, connection, and anger. So those are our seven main universal emotions, and each emotion has a physical movement with it. So for example, if I'm feeling disgusted at something, you know that gross face that you make when something smells like bad, that like, ugh, you know, that's disgust, and that's like pushing away. Like you're putting your arms out and like, oh, like I don't want that kind of thing. So each emotion also has a physical reaction to it.
SPEAKER_00I'm really happy you mentioned the word joy because sometimes when we think about emotions, we forget that we have happy emotions as well, not just sad emotions.
SPEAKER_01It does seem out of balance. Like if we look at the seven, there's really only two that are kind of like quote unquote happy ones. And it's just like, oh.
SPEAKER_00How does this relate? Because I know certain emotions affect different parts of the bodies in different ways.
SPEAKER_01In general, the emotions are going to affect you. You'll experience it physically with that kind of physical reaction that each one has. So depending how long you're kind of in that emotion. So, for example, if we use that disgust example with that pushing away, you might feel disgusted for a while and it might feel really gross and heavy in your body, like your stomach, you might feel kind of nauseous, kind of like just that downturn face, like where you're just disgusted, right? Like you'll be experiencing like that. But then longer term, it can evolve into disease and dis-ease. So, like just feeling uncomfortable, kind of in perpetuality. It can create potential issues in your body, like with your organs and stuff. Kind of your basic needs, and this is for any of the emotions, if they're kind of running rapid, our basic uh needs, so that's sleep, air, food, clothing, and shelter. If those basic needs start to kind of slip away, that's when we really need to check in.
SPEAKER_00I think what's really interesting is how you describe how the long-term emotions can have a negative effect on our body. And that's something that a lot of people do not relate those emotions to. And when you mentioned just now that disgust can turn into various toxins in the body, how can we relate some of our illnesses? Can I call it illnesses?
SPEAKER_01Well, that's why I say like dis-ease, like DIS and then a dash ease. So, like that discomfort, dis-ease, you're not feeling quite right. So, when do we know? That is the million dollar question. Because like a lot of times it's so insidious how this can kind of creep up and take a long time to really settle in. And it can be from so long ago that it just feels normal to feel that way. So you might not even be aware that you're not feeling well.
SPEAKER_00So, can we have emotions that literally last long lengths of time that just stays with us, like that feeling of disgust, that feeling of sadness?
SPEAKER_01Absolutely. Fear is a really good example. Um, there's a lot of anxiety in the world, and anxiety is not feeling safe, and fear is not feeling safe. So that emotion of fear can come out in ways like anxiety, and that can be like so many people identify with just being anxious, like I'm an anxious person, like that's just a way of being almost. So, yeah, they can last a really long time.
SPEAKER_00So, can we talk about the emotion of joy and how does joy have an impact on our bodies?
SPEAKER_01Oh, well, joy is just wonderful, right? Joy is one of those magic emotions in that joy creates safety. When you're feeling really joyful, you are in a safe place, and feeling safe, you're just open, you're flowy. You can't see my arms, but I feel like gooey, you know? Like you're just there's not a lot of cares. It encourages play as well. And that's a lot of what we don't do enough of nowadays, and especially as we get older, we just don't play like we used to, and playing just creates so much of that like dopamine and adrenaline and oxytocin, like those good feeling hormones that come out. Those are the reactions we want in our body. So playing and for joy is just something we should all do.
SPEAKER_00Totally agree because we do, as adults, become a lot more serious and we get to be more playful and more joyful just in general nature, yeah. Which can definitely help us.
SPEAKER_01Well, and there's this really good quote. I don't know where it's from. We don't stop playing because we grow old, we grow old because we stop playing.
SPEAKER_00Yes, right.
SPEAKER_01Totally agree with that. Like you said, we get so serious when we become adults. Being just curious and holding on to that childlike curiosity about things, that is so cathartic to the whole system because then it takes something that could be potentially a bigger deal. But like when you come at it with like curiosity, like, oh, I wonder about this, and why is it like that? And what's going on, instead of like, oh my god, this is happening again, and what's going on? The intensity is so different when you come in with curiosity, and joy really creates that, it allows for that playfulness.
SPEAKER_00The emotion of anger, because there's isn't that saying that the anger will eat you up. Oh, yeah. Oh, is that the wrong emotion? I think any of the emotions can really eat you up.
SPEAKER_01Because, like, even joy, you can have false joy, and that will eat you up too. I think any of them gone unchecked for long enough at a high enough intensity that has to wear on you somehow, right?
SPEAKER_00So, how does anger affect us? Because a lot of people become angry about something or someone, and they harbor that anger for long lengths of time. Well, for those people who don't let anger go. What emotions does anger have on our bodies?
SPEAKER_01Oh, anger is one of the very misunderstood emotions, and it's a very feared emotion because you don't want to come across as angry. You don't want to come across as irritated, like you want to be more appealing and appeasing. But anger is required to create boundaries. So, I mean, it is a very powerful emotion when used with intention and properly. Depending on your upbringing and what was allowed in your household, perhaps other emotions weren't allowed to be shown. So anger became the way to show it, or the other way around, right? So maybe you weren't allowed to show anger. So now you have other emotions that are kind of more expressive, but underneath them is anger. And so a really good example of pairing of this, anger and sadness are kind of best friends like that. So I've seen it so many times where there's somebody who's really, really sad, but underneath that sadness is a lot of anger at the wrong that's been done to them. And then on the other side, I've seen a lot of people very angry when really underneath they're so sad at what's happened to them.
SPEAKER_00It really helps to put things into perspective in terms of everyone's perception of that emotion of anger. Yeah. And I like the way you related that anger to sadness as well, because often they are quite combined.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. I mean, for my own story, like I remember realizing how angry I was, and I was very startled at it. I was like, I'm not an angry person though. Like, what? What is going on? And it was a strange negotiation, and it lasted a long time. I would even say years. I was really kind of sifting through and understanding and figuring it out because it was so foreign that sadness was allowed, but not anger. And so to allow anger out was like, whoa, like this is a whole new territory.
SPEAKER_00And then we've got two more emotions, which I'm sure probably connected as well, but shame and connection.
SPEAKER_01So shame is another, they're all beautiful, but is another beautiful emotion in that we don't like to feel shame. That doesn't feel good. And the action of shame is a drive for change. So if you're ever feeling ashamed or shameful, what is it that made you feel like that? You have an opportunity now to change it. And this is kind of where ignorance comes in too. A lot of people are afraid of speaking up about a lot of things because they don't want to be wrong about it. They're afraid they're gonna be ignorant. If you're very honest in your ignorance, like you really don't know what you don't know, and then you're corrected, you're gonna feel a bit of shame, like, oh, how did I miss that? I can't believe I did that wrong, or do you know whatever the internal dialogue is? But then it gives you an opportunity to grow and change from that. So shame is a really beautiful emotion.
SPEAKER_00As you rightly say, no one likes to be seen to be wrong because everyone likes to say face, particularly in exactly.
SPEAKER_01And like actually, that's a great segue into um there are two kinds of shame. So we have a constructive shame, and that's the one that I was kind of describing, where you're wrong about something, you're correct it, and then it's like, oh, that's embarrassing, but then you move on and do better moving forward. So that's a constructive shame. The destructive shame is when you make yourself wrong for it. Like I'm a bad person because I said this or did that, or I am wrong as a human being. And that one is a very kind of collapsing shame. And that's the one where it's like the color drains from your face. You can feel like your blood going out your feet, kind of thing, right? Like that is a destructive shame. And connection. Yes, connection. So this is the other feel-good one. They've done studies and stuff on elderly people and what's the most important thing for their health as we age and get into like 70s, 80s, 90 years old. And above all of everything, it seems to keep coming out that connection, like having somebody to talk to, having one person kind of thing. Like it doesn't have to be a lot, but just like maintaining that connection is what really brings so much health and joy and vitality to somebody's life and purpose, even. So connection is so, so, so important. And it's kind of like joy, it releases a lot of those like good, happy chemicals and hormones, and it makes you feel awake. It makes you feel your senses are sharpened, you feel safe. It's a feeling of love, really. And love is actually like bigger than that. Love is harder to describe, but it is that tenderness that you would feel in love. And you can have that kind of loving connection with people that are like outside of your partner. I think a lot of times we think love can really only be applied to your significant other. You know what I mean? Like that kind of intensity, but really like a really good connection with somebody that you really care about and love, like that, that's so good for the soul.
SPEAKER_00I think we're very social beings and being around people does make us healthier.
SPEAKER_01And that's why, like, if you're in, let's say you're in one of the other emotions, like let's use the sadness one, for example, reaching out to somebody and just having that connection, like you don't have to say or do anything or fix anything, like nothing like that. Like sometimes just having that person in the room with you is so cathartic. Having that person on the phone, even though you're not talking, is so cathartic. Like just having that connection is so healing.
SPEAKER_00So, Ashley, what prompted you to study the emotions within the body?
SPEAKER_01I honestly had, if you would have told 10 years ago me that this is what I'd be talking about, I wouldn't believe you. It came on very accidentally. I was a personal trainer for about 12 years, and I noticed early on that my clients would have kind of emotional outbursts in the middle of a session. So they would either get really angry or super frustrated or really sad, like just big emotions out of nowhere. And I was just like, whoa, what is going on here? We're doing shoulder press or we're doing squats. Why are you crying? It was really kind of strange. So the first couple of times I didn't think much of it, but it happened enough that I was like, okay, there's something else going on here. And so down the rabbit hole I went, and for the better part of a decade, I just was looking because I was like, there is something more happening here that's hard to quantify. We can't really touch it. It's not tangible, but it's there and it's having a literal physical effect on the body. And so I studied a lot of things in my 10 years, just trying to find what it was I was looking for. And ultimately I found uh body namic, which is a muscular psychotherapy from uh Copenhagen, actually. And they nailed it for me. So that's where I knew I was like, okay, this is what I've been looking for. This makes a lot of sense. I mean, that's kind of yeah, that's the cool's notes of how I got here. But it was definitely not the plan, but it's the direction that I ended up going.
SPEAKER_00How have you helped people turn that emotion around into something positive?
SPEAKER_01Well, really, a lot of the time, just being aware of it is the first step, and it's the biggest step. Because, like I said earlier, a lot of times the way that we're feeling is just so normalized within ourselves. We don't realize that we're not feeling well or that we're not at a better capacity of what we could be. So just having that awareness is the best thing that's happened for a lot of my clients, actually, and for myself personally. Cause when you see it, that's when you can start to make change. That's when you can be like, oh, like I see that trigger now, or I see this behavior pattern that I'm doing. I see this, you know, like you can start recognizing yourself outside of yourself. And that clarity that gives you an opportunity to step back and be like, oh, do I want to continue this or do I want to try something different? And so that has probably been the biggest and best thing for my clients just to kind of get started.
SPEAKER_00Ashley, I thank you for your time on this podcast.
SPEAKER_01Thank you for having me. This has been a lot of fun. I love talking about this stuff.
SPEAKER_00If you would like to leave any comments about this episode, then please visit the website Debbie WilliamsPodcast.com.