Negative energy can feel overwhelming.

Life is stressful, and if we don’t know how to transform negative emotions, negative energy can take over and leave us feeling anxious, frustrated, angry, moody, and stuck.

Negative energy has a huge impact on our physical bodies as well.

It can cause stomachaches, headaches, muscle tension, low libido, sleep disturbance, exhaustion, unexplained pain, menstrual issues, digestive issues, and worse.

Negative energy, in short, is really stressful.

And stress is a key factor in many chronic illnesses, including heart disease, Alzheimer’s disease, and diabetes. (1)

But don’t let this list stress you out even more.

Because stress can be useful too, so long as it doesn’t get out of hand.

Stress is a physiological response that evolved as a key factor for survival.

It pumps blood out of your digestive tract and into your muscles so you have more power to either fight or run away, fast, when faced with a threat.

It helps you hone your focus so you can do exactly what needs to get done, and fast.

Without stress, you’d become an easy target for predators in the wild.

The problem is, most of us no longer live in the predator-filled environment for which this response was designed.

But your body doesn’t know that.

And it responds the same way to threats (negative energy) that your mind constructs as it does to physical threats.

Nowadays, the vast majority of our stress triggers are thought-based.

And this means that our stress isn’t just spiked on occasion.

Many of us are dealing with stressful negative energy on a daily, if not hourly basis.

We don’t have lions threatening to eat us, but we get stressed out when we think about deadlines and unending to-do lists.

Stress is triggered by worry about the future and regrets from the past.

And it’s made worse by neurological patterning that causes us to ruminate over the same fears, over and over and over again, hoping that our thoughts will set us free.

But no matter how much your mind tries to convince you otherwise, the solution will never be found in your thoughts.

You will only feel better once you learn how to process and transform stressful negative energy through your body.

You can’t think your way out of this one.

Because when stress is unprocessed, it ends up getting lodged in our bodies and neurological patterns, causing all of the issues described above.

In Chinese medicine there is a saying, “Bu tong ze tong, tong ze bu tong,” which translates to “Where there is no movement, there is pain; Where there is movement, there is no pain.”

And if we look at the origins of the word “emotion” we find that it breaks down to “e” or “ex,” which means “out” in latin, and “movere,” which means to move.

It wouldn’t be wrong to superimpose a more modern interpretation onto this, which is that emotions are energy (“e”) in motion.

Either way, one thing is clear.

Negative energy in the form of emotions is meant to move.

This means that negative emotions are there to be felt, physically, and expressed your body.

But more often than not, we turn away from emotions we interpret to be negative.

The problem is, because they have to move, emotions don’t just go away when you ignore them.

When you don’t let your negative emotions move through your body, it causes pain on both emotional and physical levels.

The only way to get rid of negative emotions is to allow them to move through you so they can transform.

This means you have to give yourself the space to express your emotions.

Let’s break that word down, too.

“Ex” again meaning “out,” and “press,” so “express” literally means “to press out.”

Emotional expression might mean sobbing, or sighing, or screaming, or shaking.

If you’ve suppressed your emotions for a long time, you might find your body needs to express emotions in even more extreme ways, coughing, vomiting, or making you use the toilet.

These are all healthy reactions and signs of emotional release.

Sometimes, just knowing that you have permission to express your emotions is enough to let them move and transform.

But it can also be really scary.

Part of you knows that once you let your emotions move, you’re going to change.

And even if that change is exactly what you’ve been craving, the unfamiliarity of it can be enough to keep you stuck.

If you find that you have trouble expressing emotions, get help.

Find an acupuncturist or bodyworker who specializes in emotional release.

Find a therapist who specializes in somatic therapy.

And make sure you take the steering wheel on your healing journey.

Start a mindful movement practice like yoga or qigong.

Create a daily ritual with meditation and journaling.

Just the act of showing up for these practices can be enough to create lasting changes.

Most of all, focus your energy on what your body wants to do and away from the stories your mind is trying to tell you.

Your body knows exactly what it needs in order to transform stress and negative emotions.

Follow its lead and you’ll feel free.