Emotions, Anger, Guilt & Emotional Honesty
"People refuse to recognize complexity, he said. What's shame in one
man is grief in another, and they are not the same thing. What's
pig-stupidity is cowardice in another and blind in a third, and they are not
the same thing, either. You'd think that would be simple enough to
understand but it's not, not at all simple."
- Ward Just, The
Weather in Berlin
Improving our Emotional Tool Box
Each emotion offers us an essential truth and insight into what it means to be human. While emotions are a window into our own reality, thinking offers the balanced perspective of including the reality of the other. One challenge of aging well is to incorporate feelings and thinking together.
If feelings are pushed to the background (certainly one legacy
of WASP culture), they will sneak back into the foreground through
physical symptoms or other creative efforts. Emotions will naturally
move on and change if they are not ignored. There is a balancing
act to learn in managing emotions. Responding is the goal rather
than knee-jerk reacting. Each emotion deserves respect and,
at the same time, needs to be kept in line.
Feelings are a guide to who you are. Your feelings do not define another
person's reality or a greater world view. Some people need to be reminded that
their feelings are not the lynchpin to the universe. It is important not to
be emotionally lazy and just go along for the ride. Do the work to sort through feelings and learn to make distinctions.
Our culture gives men less permission to be in touch with their
emotions, while women are often dismissed because of their emotions
and labeled as hysterical or branded with PMS. Clearly there
is a cultural ambivalence towards emotions because they can
be messy and hard to understand. It helps to become comfortable
with the vocabulary of feelings. In 1979 in my work with incest
victims, I patented a technique of writing 400+ feeling words
on index cards. Clients would sort though the index cards and
build a smaller pile of words that fit their feelings. Then
they would use each card in the smaller pile to make sentences
using that word to describe themselves. For anyone lacking a
strong emotional vocabulary, this technique offers the opportunity
to learn and fatten up their abilities. It is often suggested
that couples try this technique at home with each other to build
communication skills.
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Feeling
Vocabulary List
(click above link for a list to view/print to use at home)
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Feelings Each Have a Function
1. Love - offers connection. It is generous.
2. Fear - is learning "I don’t know." It teaches us to ask questions and is one way we learn humility. It is important to remember that uncertainty is a huge part of life.
3. Grief/Sadness - makes us all smaller. Returns us to a sense of privacy in being alone with ourselves. Reminds us of how fragile our lives are. Time changes the
sorrow, so eventually it takes up less space in our hearts.
4. Anger - if it is aimed at someone, anger is much more hurtful. Being angry is different than wanting to hurt someone. It draws a line in the sand. Separates us from others. Can be constructive disagreement or destructive. The healthy side of anger defines you as important, the ugly side of anger is to be too self-important. Conflict
is a sign of growth. Remember, challenge can be an affirmation.
5. Hate - People hate when anger is not a constructive working part of their emotional tool box. It
can be destructive and becomes an attempt to eliminate the other. There is still a powerful connection.
6. Gratitude - knowing what is enough. Appreciating blessings.
7. Sex - the function is pleasure and sensuality.
8. Joy - the function is to feel free. Get Fat with Joy. Fun can be a
substitute for real joy.
9. Healthy Guilt - a reminder of obligation that is due.
Unhealthy Guilt - a pile of resentments that are lurking in the background, waiting to be cashed in.
Scroll further down to read more on guilt.
10. Humor - makes the hard parts of life more bearable. Evolves into being even more precious as we age. A release. Humor is an alternative to despair.
11. Letting Go - Moving on.
12. Excitement - proves energy to do new things. It requires expansion.
13. Confusion - crucial to tolerate. Important to the beginning of change.
14. Embarrassment - different than the heavy depths of shame. This can often be secret delight.
15. Shame - we are supposed to be pinched by shame so that we learn enough to do it differently next time. We are not supposed to drown in this emotion. Shame comes from outside of us. We are afraid to be seen by others. A sense of belonging
is an antidote to shame.
16. Pain - something is off-kilter. Know you will survive it and it will make you stronger. One of the strengths of Buddhism is a profound acceptance of pain and suffering as a part of life.
Making pain bearable is part of our life's work.
17. Jealousy - can be a guide post to your wants. Also can evolve into ugly unreasonable selfishness.
18. Passion - “That was the singular gift of passion: it eradicated fear” from The Rules of Engagement by Anita Brookner
19. Bitterness - Too many disapointments, not enough hope. This is one of the most dangerous of emotions because, it is possible to be stuck in bitterness for decades. Think of bitterness as a warning signal like the robot in the 1950's TV show, Lost in Space, repeating “Danger, Will Robinson, Danger.”
Indulging emotions leads to poor judgment. Poor judgment matters because you set yourself up to waste your life choices.
Emotions are a physical experience. Notice the ways different emotions play out in your body. Do not disconnect your emotions from experiencing your body more fully.
Polarities
Feelings travel together with their opposites. If you feel lopsided in an emotion and want more movement, ask yourself what is the other side, the polarity. The easiest duet to relate to is fear and excitement. Doing anything brand new always offers both emotions. You may have trained yourself to only pay attention to one side. It’s time to relearn that both are available. Here are other feelings and their possible polarities. Owning both creates a greater range of possibilities.
| Anger |
<--------> |
Hurt |
| Trust |
<--------> |
Betrayal |
| Loss/Sadness |
<--------> |
Joy/Fullness |
| Boredom |
<--------> |
Creativity/Curiosity |
| Shame |
<--------> |
Belonging |
| Disappointment |
<--------> |
Satisfaction |
| Being
Stuck |
<--------> |
Taking
Action |
| Self
Interest |
<--------> |
Gratitude |
| Stingy |
<--------> |
Generous |
| Intimacy |
<--------> |
Distance |
| Self-Obsessed |
<--------> |
Social
Duty |
| Desperate |
<--------> |
Lucky |
There is comfort when you have the full range available within yourself,
and life is so much more interesting. For example when self help groups like AA offer individuals a sense of belonging this reduces the individual experience of shame.
Emotional Honesty Requires Understanding
More About Anger and a Willingness to Repair
Anger
"Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it an someone else; you are the one who gets burned."
- Buddha
Anger is a much maligned emotion, because most people go from
silence to intense outrage. Speaking more authentically, describing
hurts and wants in smaller doses is not the norm. In our culture,
people go from 0 to 60, collecting enough gripes until they
are ready to be cashed in.
The risk of being more emotionally honest is the risk to be
more authentic. Didn't Oscar the Grouch seem more honest than
the other characters on Sesame Street? He wasn't choiceful
enough, so his anger was too much of a personality style.
Choicefulness is what makes us mentally healthy. The excuses
people use internally to avoid and deflect anger are experienced
by all of us: "I don't want to hurt the other."
On an old television episode of Homicide, the cop asks the 80-year-old
murderer, "I don't understand, why didn't you just divorce your wife
instead of murdering her?" He responds, "I didn't want to hurt her
feelings."
Emotional honesty requires a balancing act, an internal Geiger counter
that incorporates both of these positions:
Two examples of imbalance that are common in relationships.
Women will often retroflect and bury their wants and needs to such an extent
that they will become depressed in a marital relationship. They are lopsided
in not wanting to hurt others and end up erasing themselves. Men will often
take care of their own needs and ignore the consequences to their spouse.
Both of these positions are saturated in short-term thinking and will not
work for the long haul. It is a more thoughtful strategy that incorporates
both of these as a way to create the infrastructure of communication in a
relationship. This requires greater flexibility, adaptability, and the
willingness to embrace complexity.
Choicefully sharing greater emotional range creates a depth to a
relationship. In the long term this means that you really know each other
instead of just bumping up against the agreeable facade.
Anger in smaller doses adds spice to a relationship; it keeps things
interesting. Overreaction is scary and overwhelming, while being irritated
or annoyed is the stuff of conversations and true dialogue. A relationship
without anger can be as bland as a meal without herbs and spices.
Many partners go along in silence because they feel it is easier to
submit to one voice deciding instead of the messiness of two voices solving
conflict. This messiness creates the same atmosphere that we bargain for
when we choose to live in a democracy. The nature of the beast in democracy
is to negotiate so that both sides win and lose. It takes a great deal of
work to hear all of the voices, which is the same work that we do in a
family, a family in which more truth can be spoken. Risking disagreement and
doing the work of negotiating produces long-term results.
There are two choices with anger:
If the tension or conflict is channeled through respect, then you can
acknowledge what's important to the other person in the midst of knowing
what's important to yourself.
This creates a complicated elegance and a more authentic exchange between
two people. For example: one partner likes to tile the floor
quickly and get the job done. The other partner would rather
go more slowly and carefully because he or she will notice
every imperfection of a quick job. What's important is that
each person knows this is true for each other and both agree
to make a choice instead of fighting for the reason that someone
has to be right and someone has to be wrong. It is healthy
to have conflict worked out where both people have
a voice.
Beyond Anger: A Guide For Men by Thomas Harbin
The Dance of Anger: A Woman's Guide by Harriet Lerner
Hurt: The Flipside of Anger
Hurt is the soft side of hardened anger. There
is no other way to soften hurt except to talk and talk and
talk and talk about it. It was so hard on World War II veterans
because their style in life was not to talk about the unbearable
pain they witnessed. It was hard on Vietnam Vets when no one
was interested in their stories. Emotional honesty requires
being able to be vulnerable and being choiceful about who
to share with.
Repair
It is normal to have trouble and breakdowns in
all relationships. In fact, a relationship hasn't really been
tested until the process of resolving trouble has occurred.
A willingness to repair a relationship is crucial in marriage,
parenting, and friendship. It is a position showing greater
class if you can reach out, be willing to learn something
new, and take responsibility for hurting another.
Since parenting and marriage are 24/7 jobs, it is impossible not to screw
up. Taking ownership of screwing up is often all that one can do, and that
is exactly the right way to create solid trust and greater potential for
truth.
Making amends is a wonderful part of AA/NA. Taking time to write someone
a letter acknowledging past misdeeds is something that benefits everyone.
As Al Pacino says in his speech in the end of the movie Scent
of a Woman, "The right thing to do is the hard thing to do."
Make repairing relationships something that you seriously embrace because it
matters more than you realize instead of being emotionally lazy.
Guilt
"Guilt was not merely a weakness, it was misleading, casting one's entire life into doubt."
From Making Things Better by Anita Brookner.
So many people suffer from excessive guilt which makes life so much more difficult. Guilt triggers depression, anxiety & low self esteem. The religious culture of both Catholics & Jews makes guilt more difficult to bear.
Guilt that pinches us to do better next time is totally reasonable. Guilt that simply makes you feel bad about yourself for decades is totally unreasonable. Think through your guilt and make the distinction: what's unreasonable & what's reasonable?
Many times unreasonable guilt is really all about resentments that you are pretending don't exist. So ask yourself, are there any resentments underneath your guilty feelings.
Many times unreasonable guilt means you haven't accepted your own humanity. We all make mistakes and only stop on the day that we die. Our dark side is part of our nature # we make it smaller every decade, though it will never go away. Forgiving ourselves matters. Ruining our lives with excessive guilt that is a breeding ground for insidious doubt that can ruin a lifetime. What good is that?
Speaking up and being more authentic is helpful to diffusing
guilt. The more you swallow from others and suffer in silence,
the more you add to your depression. It is cultural to define
speaking up as being mean or hurting someone’s feelings.
Think of speaking up as an opportunity to teach someone else
what is reasonable or unreasonable from your point of view.
The relationship only has a chance at being an authentic dyad
if both people risk more honesty. When energy goes back and
forth to accommodate both of their differences, it is a more
complex relationship and more often satisfying for longer
to both because there is greater opportunity for dialogue.
A majority of couples more often have a power dynamic that Fritz
Perls referred to as:
Depressed energy and silence feed the Underdog position. Many partnerships
mirror this second arrangement, in which the Underdog enables by
hiding in the "presumed safety" of being silent and
unknown. This proven dynamic is much less interesting, though
it is less work and more simplistic. The Top Dog tends toward
monologue and being self-serving, making convenient assumptions about the
other. Ask yourself, "Have I swallowed too much and cooperated in keeping myself invisible?"
Homework:
• Guilt Exercise
(downloadable PDF form)
Write in one column what you feel guilty about, as many examples as
you can think of all at once. Then look through them and see if there
is a legitimate reasonable obligation to address or is there
an unspoken resentment being hoarded about what is unreasonable?
What it Means to be Human
One of my favorite passages on how impossible it is to understand someone else and yet we are compelled to keep on trying anyway;
“You fight your superficiality, your shallowness, so as to try to come at people without unreal expectations, without an overload of bias or hope or arrogance, as untanklike as you can be, sans cannon and machine guns and steel plating half a foot thick; you come at them unmenacingly on your own ten toes instead of tearing up the turf with your caterpillar treads, take them on with an open mind, as equals, man to man, as we used to say, and yet you never fail to get them wrong. You might as well have the brain of a tank. You get them wrong before you meet them, while you’re anticipating meeting them; you get them wrong while you’re with them; and then you go home to tell somebody else about the meeting and you get them all wrong again. Since the same generally goes for them with you, the whole thing is really a dazzling illusion empty of all perception, an astonishing farce of misperception. And yet what are we to do about this terribly significant business of other people, which gets bled of the significance we think it has and takes on instead a significance we think it has and takes on instead a significance that is so ludicrous, so ill-equipped are we all to envision one another’s interior workings and invisible aims? Is everyone to go off and lock the door and sit secluded like the lonely writers do, in a soundproof cell, summoning people out of words and then proposing that these word people are closer to the real thing than the real people that we mangle with our ignorance every day? The fact remains that getting people right is not what living is all about anyway. It’s getting them wrong that is living, getting them wrong and wrong and wrong and then, on careful reconsideration, getting them wrong again. That’s how we know we’re alive: we’re wrong. Maybe the best thing would be to forget being right or wrong about people and just go along for the ride. But if you can do that - well, lucky you.”
- from the book American Pastoral by Phillip Roth
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