3-Part Feelings

3-Part Feelings

I was watching someone yelling at someone the other day, and started thinking about feelings, emotions, and validation.

I have learned some really useful things in all my years of training, research and practice. One of those is that emotions are universal, feelings are not.

Emotions are the physiological manifestation of thought, either conscious or unconscious. Everyone, unless there is some kind of damage, has the same set, like when the doc taps your knee and your leg jerks. Emotions are pretty much hardwired.

Emotions are, very simply put; happy, sad, angry, scared, contempt, disgust, and surprise. That’s it.

Feelings, on the other hand, are not hardwired. They are not universal. They are sklooshy, personal, and often really weird and smelly, based on horrible mislearning, and awful beliefs.

I’m not always comfortable with my feelings, or with yours. And I’m not sure I want you to validate all my feelings, because some of them are pretty messed up.

I mean, if I’m telling you that I feel completely disgusted by what a bad person I am, or you are,  because I, or you, forgot a date, bounced a check, didn’t mail a letter, eat meat/gluten/dairy, ran out of gas, can’t sleep, have a blemish, and so on, do we really want that disgust validated?

If I am screaming at you about anything that isn’t a warning of imminent danger, do I want that behavior validated?

If I am wailing or blaming or shaming because something didn’t go my way, do I want that behavior validated?

Notice that feelings are often three-part; one part emotion, one part justification, one part behavior.

Often, when we ask for our feelings to be validated, what we are actually asking is for our outrageous behavior to be given a stamp of approval.

I was shocked when I discovered that I could feel sad without weeping and wailing and sobbing, that I could feel angry without yelling or cursing or carrying on, that I could feel scared without a panic attack. When I experience my emotions inside, noticing them, acknowledging them without the justification and behavior parts, they move through really quickly.

Experiencing our emotions all the way to the end is excellent. It completes our experience, and we end up clean. On the other hand, expressing them through extravagant behavior ends up creating even more trauma for us, because now we have feelings about throwing the whatever, or shrieking insults at our whomever, or any of a host of things.

The bottom line is this: If I want a happy, peaceful life, I have to be willing to give up the drama. My drama, and validating your drama.

How have I changed from indulging in emotional drama to experiencing my emotions?

(c) Pam Guthrie 2013 all rights removed 10112013