By Daniel J. Benor, MD, ABHM     

Tensions and conflicts in family relationships may arise during the holidays due to lingering hurts, angers, fears and resentments from conflicts that occurred many years ago. Who of us has not experienced frustrations, angers and hurts at some time in our family relationships? Who does not have unresolved residues of unpleasant feelings from such interactions? Who has not felt a measure of tension or stress in planning a holiday get together, worrying about who crotchety aunt Tillie would be best seated next to in order to avoid abrasive or perhaps even explosive interactions that could ruin the festive holiday atmosphere?       

Politeness can be poisonous

Such problems often arise out of our wishes to be polite and not cause a conflict when a family member hurts our feelings. This can be especially true when those who stepped on our toes are rare visitors from afar. We don't want to make a scene by complaining or confronting them, so we swallow down our feelings in order to preserve the calm and peace.

Feelings that are swallowed down tend to fester inside. They often sit in the same inner file drawer with similar hurts and angers from the past that were unspoken but left their residues – from interactions with the same person or with others.

When feelings are stashed away inside ourselves, they sit an wait for opportunities to be released. Adding a new item to the file drawer stirs the rest of the festering issues. Our response to the new issue may be stronger than warranted, because it has brought back memories from some of the well-seasoned, festering items in that drawer. In some cased, we are not actually conscious of the earlier items, but our unconscious mind squirms with the buried discomforts on some dim level of our awareness, and may invite us to discharge old feelings in response to the new item that we are stashing in that file drawer.

Susan's grandfather had been a particularly unpleasant person at her family's holiday table when she was growing up. He lived far away, believed that children should be seen and not heard, and would become offended and even more unpleasant if Susan's mother, his daughter, said anything in Susan's defense when he was correcting her table manners. Susan always felt a knot in her stomach when she recalled those family gatherings.

After her marriage, Susan dreaded the holiday get-togethers with her parents and in-laws because the two families had very different views on politics and many other topics. More often than not, the holiday atmosphere was soured with arguments, even though everyone walked on eggshells. Susan found herself enraged at times over these sorts of tensions. She realized her responses were way out of proportion to the issues that were raised or to the conflicting opinions expressed by family members, because she herself didn't particularly care one way or the other about many of the topics that inflamed other family members.

Clearing out the garbage in our file drawers

Contrary to common wisdom that "It's better to let sleeping dogs lie," there are now simple, potent, easily learned methods that enable us to release the garbage we've stashed in our file drawers. Even better, these methods enable us to neutralize and release the feelings in our current situations that annoy us, so that we stop hiding these feelings from explosive issues in our family relationships.

WHEE: Whole Health – Easily and Effectively® is a method I find easy to learn and very rapidly and deeply effective. By alternating stimulation to the right and left sides of the body, while reciting a personalized affirmation, it is possible to let go of whatever stirs our annoyance, anger or hurt feelings.

In addition, WHEE offers two other benefits.
First, at the same time that we let go of our current irritations, we can also release whatever other feelings of the same sorts are sitting in the file drawer where we would have otherwise stashed the current feelings.

Susan learned WHEE in a telephone session, and in that one lesson was able to sort out her holiday anxieties in just a few minutes. She was very pleased to find she could also empty her file drawers of a whole bundle of feelings from previous years' holiday sore-spots, and even more delighted at being able to release her childhood residues of hurt and angry feelings from her grandfather's abrasiveness at the holiday table.

Second, we can install positive feelings and expectations to replace the negative ones we have released. Using the same WHEE process, we can start with a statement such as, "I will be able to listen to my family's opinions, whatever they are, and know that they are entitled to their views. I don't have to change them or fix them or worry about how they get along with each other. That is their problem to sort out." Just like the WHEE enables us to reduce the intensity of negative feelings, it enables us to quickly install positive ones.

I've been pleased to help people not only with phone consultations but also through my new book on releasing pains of all sorts: "Seven Minutes to Natural Pain Release." Here is what one reader shared:

I have had your book for a while now and I find it very informative and helpful with many situations in my life.

The pain I had was an emotional pain I had with my mother and it has been deep for many years.  I have finally found the help I needed to forgive her and get over the terrible feelings I was carrying for soooooo long, I now have peace and good feelings for her and I am so greatful that it happened  while she is still here for me to share some good times with her.  I hope this helps someone.

Sharon

Your feedback on this article is welcomed.

Dan
DB@paintap.com

You may reproduce all or parts of this article in your journal, magazine, ezine, blog or other web or paper publication on condition that you credit the source as follows: Copyright © 2008 Daniel J. Benor, MD, ABHM   All rights reserved. Original publication at WholisticHealingResearch.com where you will find many more related articles on this and similar subjects of wholistic healing.

Further information about WHEE

Basics of the WHEE process

WHEE Videos

Appreciations for benefits of WHEE

Problems helped by WHEE

Book on WHEE for Pain 

WHEE workbook

WHEE workshops

Articles:
   Introductory WHEE article
 
   WHEE for trauma and re-entry problems 
 
   WHEE for children

   WHEE-kly brief articles

WHEE research