The Importance of Feeling Feelings

For the beginning intuitive & spiritual seeker, coming into relationship with the emotional body is essential for physical, emotional & psychic health, for accuracy of our intuitive guidance & for improving our relationships. 

So many of us have the belief that negative emotions serve no useful purpose, or are an indication that we're doing something wrong.  We may end up frustrated with ourselves for our feelings of anger, grief, or hatred & we may try to cover up our discomfort with depression or unending activity.  

When we know that emotions are information & energy, we can approach our emotional bodies with less fear & judgment. Then it becomes a task of exploration & self discovery to jump into our emotions, even the uncomfortable ones.

Our health, both physical & emotional, is dependent on free flowing feelings. Unresolved feelings don't disappear with time. Instead, they become blocked within our physical & emotional bodies, sometimes even creating disease. So many people believe that time heals all wounds & so they let time pass in the hope that they (or their loved ones) will feel differently.  I've found this not to be true. 

Old hurts, angers & resentments don't fade without being dealt with directly or thru personal growth work. The surest way to move a feeling out of our bodies is to be willing to experience it in the moment.  Because past unresolved hurts are still in the present, we can heal a past hurt by feeling it now.  (Some emotional traumas need assistance from a healer or therapist to be moved out of the body effectively.  See Illuminations for one method of moving trauma out of the energybody.) 

For Intuitives, if our emotional bodies are cluttered or hidden from us, our intuitive hits will end up distorted, or we'll confuse our own unresolved emotions for an intuitive hit. 

Also, because we're empathic, we're very sensitive to emotional energy. Knowing our emotional bodies intimately prevents us from taking on & absorbing the emotional energy of those around us; we're able to claim what is ours & refuse what is someone else's. 

When we're clear about our emotional responses, our intuitive guidance is able to use those feelings as channels.  Many times during my own readings, if I experience emotions that I know aren't mine, I can interpret them as clues to what my client needs to hear next.

Emotional energy, when understood, gives us information about how our innerselves are reacting to the outerworld.  We need our emotional responses to live effective lives.  People who don't pay attention to their emotions miss important cues to how their relationships are unfolding.  

They may also find themselves projecting their unwanted emotions on to others. The more out of touch we are from our feelings, the more our feelings & emotions run our lives unconsciously. When we're fully aware of our emotions, we're at choice whether to follow them or not. 

The most emotionally dissociated people think they're run by logical thought process, but if observed for long enough, it's apparent that the fear of facing their emotional body is the main motivating factor in their lives. (For more explanation, see the essay, Emotional Dissociation .) 

It's in our best interest to explore underneath our emotional responses because the more we try to hide any aspect of ourselves from ourselves, the more that aspect will push forward to be restored to consciousness.  The way the shadow side of ourselves pushes forward is usually very unpleasant & can create unsavory situations in our lives & in the lives of our loved ones. 

We do everyone a favor when we become willing to dive into ourselves. This takes tremendous courage & faith in ourselves & our basic goodness.  When we uncover our shadow side we realize that we hold the whole spectrum of emotions & that those emotions hold positive gifts for us. 

Some examples are: anger can help us hold our boundaries & strengthen our personal power & sadness & grief can help us have compassion for others.

Embracing our emotional responses by being willing to feel all our feelings & think all the thoughts generated by those feelings is the key to self awareness & emotional well being.  As we do so we develop the experiential knowledge that our identity isn't based on our feelings or on our thoughts; those feelings & thoughts are transitory. 

Being willing to face our feelings enables us to face & understand others' emotional needs as well.  In fact, it's only to the extent that we know our emotional bodies that we can experience intimacy with others, or be a healing presence for others.  We also discover that emotions are simply energy moving thru our body & we stop judging the feelings we have in the moment.

Being emotionally mature & competent means being willing to experience our emotions & being willing to face another's emotions without a need to change or dismiss emotional signals for our own immediate comfort.  When we're truly willing to do so, we open ourselves up to the deep richness of life that can't be experienced in any other way.

5 Ways Parents Can Handle Their Anger

1. Heal your angry past. Parenting can be therapeutic. It can show you where your problems are & motivate you to fix them. If your past is loaded with unresolved anger, take steps to heal yourself before you wind up harming your child.

Studies have shown that children whose mothers often express anger are more likely to be difficult to discipline. Identify problems in your past that could contribute to present anger.

• Were you abused or harshly punished as a child?
• Do you have difficulty controlling your temper?
• Do you sense a lack of inner peace?

Identify present situations that are making you angry, such as dissatisfaction with job, spouse, self, child. Remember, you mirror your emotions. If your child sees a chronically angry face & hears an angry voice, that's the person he is more likely to become.

2. Keep your perspective. Every person has an anger button. Some parents are so anger prone that when they explode the family dog hides. Try this exercise.

First, divide your children's "misbehaviors" into smallies (nuisances & annoyances) which aren't worth the wear & tear of getting angry about & biggies (hurting self, others & property) which demand a response, for your own sake & your child's.

Next, condition yourself so that you don't let the smallies bother you. Here are some "tapes" to play in your mind the next time you or your child spills something:

• "I'm angry, but I can control myself."
• "Accidents happen."
• "I'm the adult here."
• "I'm mad at the mess, not the child."
• "I'll keep calm & we'll all learn something."

Rehearse this exercise over & over by play acting. Add in some lines for you to deliver:

• "Oops! I made a mess."
• "I'll grab a towel."
• "It's ok! I'll help you clean it up."

You may notice a big contrast between this & what you heard as a child. You may also notice it won't be as easy as it sounds.

When a real-life smallie occurs, you're more conditioned to control yourself. You can take a deep breath, walk away, keep cool, plan your strategy & return to the scene.

i.e., a child smears paint on the wall. You've conditioned yourself not to explode You're naturally angry & it's helpful for your child to see your displeasure. You go thru your brief "no" lecture firmly, but without yelling. Then you call for a time-out.

Once you have calmed down, insist the child (if old enough) help you clean up the mess. Being in control of your anger gives your child the message, "Mommy's angry & she has a right to be this way. She doesn't like what I did, but she still likes me & thinks I'm capable enough to help clean up after myself."

We find going into a rage is often harder on us than the child. It leaves us feeling drained. Oftentimes, it's our after-anger feeling that bothers us more than the shoe thrown into the toilet. Once we realized that we could control our feelings more easily than our children can control their behavior, we were able to endure these annoying stages of childhood & life w/our kids became much easier.

The Circle of Anger

• Mad at child
• Mad at self
• More mad at child for causing you to get mad at yourself
• Mad at being mad

You can break this cycle at any point to protect yourself & your child.

3. Make anger your ally. Emotions serve a purpose. Healthy anger compels you to fix the problem, first because you're not going to let your child's behavior go uncorrected & second because you don't like how the child's misbehavior bothers you.

This is helpful anger. I've always had a low tolerance for babies' screams. At around age 15 months our 8th child, Lauren, developed an ear-piercing shriek that sent my blood pressure skyrocketing.

Either my tolerance was decreasing or my ears were getting more tender with age, but Lauren's cry pushed my anger button. I didn't like her for it. I didn't like myself for not liking her. It might have been easier to deal with the problem if I hadn't been feeling angry.

But because I was angry & realized it affected my attitude toward Lauren, I was impelled to do something about her cry, which I believed was an unbecoming behavior that didn't fit into this otherwise delightful little person.

So instead of focusing on how much I hated those sounds, I focused on what situations triggered the shrieks. I tried to anticipate those triggers. I discovered that when Lauren was bored, tired, hungry or ignored, she shrieked. She's a little person who needs a quick response & the shriek got it for her.

My anger motivated me to learn creative shriek-stoppers. I've become a wiser parent. Lauren has become nicer to be around. That's helpful anger.

Anger becomes harmful when you don't regard it as a signal to fix the cause. You let it fester until you dislike your feelings, yourself & the person who caused you to feel this way. You spend your life in a tiff over smallies that you could have ignored or biggies that you could have fixed. That's harmful anger.

4. Quit beating yourself up. Often anger flares inwardly, as well as outwardly, over something that you don't like; but upon reflection, after a lot of energy is spent emoting, you actually realize that the situation as it stands now is actually better for everyone concerned.

This "hindsight" keeps us humble & helps us diffuse future flare-ups. Our motto concerning irritating mistakes has become: "Nobody's perfect. Human nature strikes again."

5. Beware of high-risk situations that trigger anger. Are you in a life situation that makes you angry? If so, you're at risk for venting your anger on your child.

Losing a job or experiencing a similar self-esteem-breaking event can make you justifiably angry. But realize that this makes it easier for otherwise tolerable childish behaviors (smallies) to push you over the edge.

When you're already angry, smallies easily become biggies. If you're suddenly the victim of an anger-producing situation, it helps to prepare your family:

"I want you all to understand that daddy may be upset from to time during the next couple of months. I've just lost my job & I feel very anxious about it. I'll find another job & we'll all be okay, but if I have a short fuse & get angry at you sometimes, it's not because I don't love you, it's because I'm having trouble liking myself..."

If you do blow your top, it's wise to apologize to your children (& expect similar apologies from them when they lose their tempers): "Pardon me, but I'm angry & if I don't appear rational or appreciative, it's because I'm struggling, it's not your fault. I'm not mad at you."

It also helps to be honest with yourself, recognize your vulnerability & keep your guard up until the anger-causing problem is resolved. There will always be problems in your life that you can't control. As you become a more experienced parent & person, you'll come to realize that the only thing in your life that you can control are your own actions. How you handle anger can work for you or against you & your child.

What are some steps to work out unresolved anger?

In handling a "current" anger situation you may have come upon a "trigger" event that brings up past feelings of hurt, pain, resentment, hostility or anger. The trigger event isn't what you're actually reacting to, but rather it's the past situation, (one that went unresolved) to which you're reacting.

The following steps will assist you in working out this unresolved anger:

1.   Take a pillow or cushion & go alone to your bedroom or to a quiet location.

2.   Position yourself so that you're kneeling in front of the pillow or cushion, which is either on a bed, a chair or the floor.

3.   Begin to visualize a scene or series of scenes surrounding the situation, event or person with which you have unresolved anger.

4.    As you're visualizing the scene, begin to pound your pillow & yell out how you "feel" about the situation, event or person. Yell your guts out!

5.   Continue pounding the pillow & letting out your feelings until you feel satiated.

6.    At this point begin to use your  reason & rationality to reframe or restate the situation. Begin to allow yourself to forgive those situations, events or persons for what happened to you. Don't proceed to the next step until you can come to a "healing" of your spirit at this point. If you're stuck, repeat Steps 3 & 4.

7.   Once you feel as if you have been able to forgive & you feel healing beginning, write down what it was that made the reframed or restated situation have less blame & thus be able to be forgiven.

8.   If person(s) involved in the unresolved anger situation are still available (alive) & capable of communicating on a healing, nonblaming, feeling level, share your resolution with them & let the forgiveness & healing become alive.

        If the person(s) involved are unavailable, let the forgiveness & healing take hold in your heart.

Anger Under New Management

by Joe Kort, MSW copyright, 2004
Originally published in Between the Lines Michigan Gay and Lesbian Newspaper, July 20, 2004

Download in PDF format

I’m angry. Every time I open the paper or watch the news & the subject of marriage for gays & lesbians is raised, or when I read or hear some homophobe’s position on it, I get angry. (I refuse to say gay marriage because we're talking about the same marriage as heterosexuals; gay marriage sounds like we're talking about something different). They use misguided facts or veiled hate & prejudice in their words. I close the television or the paper & am enraged.

I know about unresolved anger & resentment. As Debbie Ford, a nationally known coach, puts it, “it is like swallowing poison & hoping the other guy dies!” Yikes!

It's not healthy to hold all of this anger & do nothing with it. I look to my books on anger management, none of which help me or seem effective. So while at a psychotherapy conference last month, I went to an anger management presentation.

To my surprise, it was different from any other that I had attended & for the first time, useful in dealing with anger & resentment.

The presenters name was Steven Stosny (www.compassionpower.com). He caught my attention in the first 5 minutes with these words, “I don’t believe in anger management.

Studies show that after 1 year of anger management classes & therapy, people relapse back to their old patterns with anger. You must find core value in yourself. If you don't value yourself enough, you will carry unresolved anger & resentment”. In hearing this I was intrigued: it made sense to me.

I began thinking about how from birth we are devalued as gays & lesbians. From the beginning as we're cradled in our parent’s arms, we're neglected in terms of the expectation that we're heterosexual.

One of the cruelest forms of punishment is to ignore someone. We're ignored from the very beginning. We all know the rest of the story about how we bury our core selves & go into hiding for being ashamed of who we are.

And we're reminded by the media daily about how little value we hold in discussions about marriage for gays. “Don’t say ‘I do’ to gay marriage” the headlines read. The military says we're of no value to them so “Don’t ask, don’t tell”. So it makes perfect sense that as a culture of gays & lesbians, we might not value ourselves & therefore carry unresolved anger & resentment.

He talked about how anger can shorten a person’s life span if not resolved. It can also lead to heart disease, stroke, cancer, hypertension, depression, anxiety, alcoholism, drug-addiction & other compulsive behavior.

The antidote, Stosny says, is to learn to value one’s self more thru self-compassion. He says, “Self-compassion & compassion for others makes us virtually immune to the ill-effects of anger.”

He goes on to say that unresolved anger is from feeling unimportant, disregarded, accused, devalued, rejected, powerless & unlovable. So the more you value yourself, the less unresolved anger you'll have. He says that one can't have compassion for one’s self & others & carry unresolved anger at the same time.

During this time of the legalizing of marriage for gays & lesbians, we must take time to value ourselves more & not wait for others to validate us. While anger can be productive, it must come from a place of valuing ourselves & each other.

In his words, “You have to regulate your own emotions, not the environment. Anger isn't for solving problems”. I understand what he means. When you're angry, all others see & hear is your anger & not your message; you're not able to be productive & do the work that needs to be done for yourself if you are stuck in anger!

Let’s not get “stuck” in anger & resentment. Let’s value ourselves & know that in our valued state we can lead our way thru this negativity we face. Let’s not make ourselves negative, or devalued or bad, let’s work on correcting the situation by regulating our feelings & taking care of ourselves & our own.

Smart Ways to value yourself are:

1. Come out to one person per week.

2. Talk to your family about marriage for gays & what's happening currently.

3. Stay updated & know the facts on marriage for gays to be able to answer questions from family & friends.

4. Register to vote & make sure you vote this November.

5. Join the Human Rights Campaign (HRC).

6. Read books on marriage for gays. Two recommended books are “Why You Should Give a Damn About Gay Marriage”, by Davina Kotulski, Ph.D. & “Gay Marriage” by Jonathon Rauch

7. If you're a gay or lesbian couple, consider going to Massachusetts & get legally married.

8. Call or email your local newspapers, anonymously if you're more comfortable & ask them if the print marriage announcements for gay & lesbian couples. 

Situational Aspects of Unresolved Emotions

Divorce & Step Families

Anger & Unresolved Emotions

"My ex-wife is bad-mouthing my new wife & me. How can we get her to see this is making life for the kids more difficult?"

Anger & unresolved emotions from the previous marital break-up often lead ex-spouses to criticize each other in an effort to gain loyalty from their children or seek revenge for perceived inequalities during the marriage.

In addition, the biological mother in question is probably feeling threatened by the stepmother's presence. Biological parents need reminding that children will always be loyal to them (unless they cut off contact).

Bad-mouthing a stepmother is unnecessary. Children can respect & obey a stepmother - even care for her deeply - & it won't ever change the strong bond they have with a biological parent.

To help alleviate this mother's misguided fear, the stepmother & husband should each communicate to his ex-wife their desire to cooperate & not hinder the children's relationship with their mother.

The stepmother, in particular, should say in a phone call or email, "I want you to know that your relationship with Beth & Amy is critical to them. Please understand that I'll never try to replace you or hinder your relationship with them.

In fact, I'm wondering what you'd like me to do to help them feel more in touch with you. Do you have any ideas? From this day forward, my commitment to you & the children is to encourage their love & respect.

If there's anything I can do differently please let me know." This may or may not impact the mother's criticism. But the hope is that this message will help her to feel less threatened & therefore, has less need to be negative about the stepmother.

Do what you can to be Christ-like to anyone in the other home - even if he or she is extremely negative. You may not be able to effect any practical change in an ex-spouse, but don't be guilty of not trying.