If you are to be the lighthouse, a beacon to others, standing strong in the wildest of storms and the calmest of seas, how do you cope when things overwhelm you?
I respectfully acknowledge that this video was recorded on the traditional territory of Mi’kmaq people.
If you’d like more information on the details of the process I use, and how you can transform your own emotions or help others to transform theirs, then please visit theEATprogram.com.
Overview of The Emotions Metaphor "Be The Lighthouse"
NOTE: The introduction is the same for each of the four intensities of the Be The Lighthouse metaphor. If you have already read it, you may want to click to skip.
Hello, my name is Karen and in this series I help you Locate, Describe & Transform™ (LDT™) the emotions that interfere with you making your best decisions. Each week I explore a new metaphor, always looking at it at four levels of emotional intensity: Extreme; High; Medium; and Low.
Check out the short overview to get details of the process I use.
This week’s metaphor is BE THE LIGHTHOUSE.
Four Emotion Intensities with Four Lighthouse Images
- For extreme intensity,we see the waves are crashing over the lighthouse; they’re completely engulfing it.
- For high intensity, we see a lighthouse surrounded by frozen water and icicles. And that can connect us to other metaphors about being left out in the cold or feeling frozen.
- For medium intensity, I’ve picked a nighttime image. It’s a beautiful image of a lighthouse with the light shining, but there’s a sense of isolation to it.
- And for the low intensity image, I’ve chosen a lighthouse that is surrounded by farmland and has extra buildings at the lighthouse itself. It seems to be a nice day, and the lighthouse is up higher on the rocks.
Just as a reminder, even if you connect with the metaphor, the lighthouse, your imagery will possibly look completely different from mine. So you may even consider closing your eyes and keeping your imagery in mind as we work through the transformations.
The Complexity Cards
Next, we’ll look at the complexity cards. I have 11 complexity cards ranging from 0 to 10. They’ve been shuffled and randomly chosen, although in this particular spread it doesn’t look random because three of them are tens. Complexity means there are many people involved, many things that you have to consider in the situation that you have emotions about.
- The extreme intensity card has a complexity of ten.
- In the high intensity, we have a complexity of ten.
- In the medium intensity, we also have a complexity of ten.
- In the low intensity, we have a complexity of four.
The Character from The Whimsical Tarot Deck
In the centre, we have a tarot card. If you’ve watched the process video, you’ll know I do not read tarot cards. I’m using this particular deck, the Whimsical Tarot deck, because it uses characters based on myths and fairy tales. This particular card, the Ace of Pentacles, doesn’t have any link to a fairy tale, it’s just picture of a pentacle on it.
Aces are the start of a cycle and Pentacles are tangible opportunities in the material world: potential for financial success; new job; a home. The Ace of Pentacles asks you to take action and invest effort to grow your opportunity into something real and lasting. So we’ll be taking that point of view as we explore each of the intensities and the imagery that we have.
As we look at these scenes and complexity cards, focus on transforming the emotions that prevent you from taking your next healthy step toward your real world goal.
Be The Lighthouse: Extreme Intensity Emotions
This is the extreme intensity, extreme complexity situation. You’re going to be feeling wrapped up in this stress or conflict, and that’s represented here by a storm that has waves towering twice as high as the lighthouse, building up, building up, building up, and then crashing over and basically swallowing it whole.
The waves recede and the lighthouse is still standing, but another onslaught is coming. There’s just this repetitive wave crashing over this lighthouse.
You're Drowning and Can't Breathe
So if you are the lighthouse in this situation, there are going to be moments where you feel like you’re drowning. And even as the waves recede and you get a chance to breathe, there’s going to be a tension that you’re feeling in your body because you’re preparing for the next onslaught.
We know it’s an extreme complexity situation, so sit quietly for a moment and consider all of the people, the options, the complications that are going on with this particular real world – because it’s the Ace of Pentacles – issue.
Be The Intuitive Lighthouse: Don't Overthink Your Transformations!
Now, when you’re transforming your negative emotions – your stresses, your fears, your anger – whatever it is, you don’t want to be thinking about it. You want to let the work happen within your body and with your intuition.
So you’re this lighthouse and those waves crashing in, if it’s saltwater, you’re likely to get rusty inside. You’re likely to have broken parts from the waves crashing against you. That’s what you want to be focusing on. Anything in your body that is carrying stress and tension.
Transformation Example
For me, for example, when I imagine myself in the position of that lighthouse, I am facing the wave, and that wave is hitting me smack in the face. So the first thing I want to do is gain an ability to breathe, because right now I’m feeling claustrophobic and I can’t breathe.
I’m afraid to take a breath because I’ll be swallowing all of that water, so the first thing I want to do is imagine – or potentially in the real world, create – a sense of personal space, a place where that wave can’t hit me.
Remember, your ultimate goal here is to be able to grab that Ace of Pentacles, that tangible opportunity, the new job, the success, the home, whatever it is for you. But you need to be able to take it on from a healthy space, not an overwhelmed space.
So your first goal here is to get yourself breathing. The visual that I use is what I call a Bright Light Bubble. Emotions aren’t rational, so your imagery shouldn’t be something you think about. It’s something that you feel. And intuitively, right now, what I want is a magical bubble surrounding me, that lighthouse, maybe twenty feet out, away from me in all directions, that protects me from any waves crashing down.
Extreme Intensity Emotions: Create the Space to Breathe
When you’re feeling an extreme intensity, extreme complexity emotion, you’re going to have to do transformation step-by-step. And your first step in this instance is to give yourself that space to breathe with that bubble in place. And you might do it in the real world by taking a time out.
If you’re at the workplace, you might close your office door. If you don’t have an office door, you might go to the washroom and sit in there for a while. You might, at home, go to your bedroom and close the door. But what you want is a space that just allows you to breathe, and then focus on your breathing.
You want to take long, slow breaths in, and long, slow breaths out. You might just need two or three of them to get you to a calm, non-reactive place so that you can determine your next healthy step.
Breathing Means Thinking
At this point, you might actually move from the extreme intensity down to a high intensity. Don’t put pressure on yourself. It’s not likely with extreme intensity, extreme complexity, that you can put all of those pieces together after just a few breaths. You’re probably going to have to take a few more steps.
But once you have that breathing space, you’ll be able to think more clearly. You’ll feel more balanced, and you’ll be able to know what the next emotion is that you need to transform.
Closing
I connect with the lighthouse metaphor for several reasons. One, I love lighthouses. I’ve lived on and travelled around coastal areas and visited a lot of lighthouses, so they speak to me. But lighthouses for me also represent those four aspects of who we are: physical component; emotional component; intellectual component; and spiritual component.
- The physical is that rock solid build and the rock formation – sometimes sand – that they’re built into: that solid foundation.
- The emotional is the waves crashing, the winds blowing, the birds flying around them.
- The intellectual is also part physical. The components that have to work together to make the lighthouse work. The inside of the lighthouse.
- And the spiritual is the light that’s flashing around that searching.
So for me, the lighthouse metaphor BE THE LIGHTHOUSE means be strong, be stable, be grounded. And be willing to help others in a way that’s healthy for yourself.
Next week we look at the Leaning Tower of Pisa.