I had a minor health issue a couple weeks ago. I went to the doctor and explained how these things seem to go from nothing to terrible really quickly for me. The doctor said, “Maybe. Or maybe you just ignore them for a long time until they’re so bad that you can’t ignore them anymore.” Shut up, Doctor! You don’t know me!
Okay, so yes, that is how I tend to handle things like minor health issues. And also feelings. That is how I handle my feelings.
I stink at feelings. Personality wise, I don’t have to deal with them much, so when they happen I feel confused and overwhelmed and frustrated. And usually they’ve been happening for awhile, but at some kind of low-grade fever level where I’ve been able to ignore them or pretend they were something other than feelings. . . like hungry or shopping. Lots of times my low-grade feelings seem like things that could be cured by nachos.
So about a year ago I was struggling with lots of feelings. BIG FEELINGS and they felt like those waves that smack you down when you’re at the beach and you know if you went a little more shallow in the water, you’d be fine and if you went a little deeper in the water, you’d be fine, but instead you stand at this spot where the waves drag you down, knock the air out of you and you wonder if you’re going to make it. Yeah. Those kinds of feelings. It was in that moment that a friend said to me, “What if your feelings are just your feelings. You don’t have to obey them and you don’t have to ignore them. Just acknowledge them.”
This felt revolutionary to me and has become a bit of a mantra when I start to feel The Feelings. I don’t have to be scared of them, I don’t have to do whatever they tell me to, I don’t have to let them run my life, I don’t have to ignore them. They are just feelings. If I let myself feel them and acknowledge them I can often hunt down the root cause and then it doesn’t feel so scary.
Have you had that moment where you’re walking down the street and you think maybe you’re being followed and you start to have this panic rising in your chest and then you actually stop and look behind you and there’s no one there, or it’s just some harmless stranger? This is what I’m doing to my feelings. I don’t want to keep walking faster and faster to get away from them until they attack me or I come to live in sheer panic. I want to turn and look them full in the face and see what’s standing there so I can deal with it.
This idea has allowed me to let other people have their feelings, too. When my kids are sad, it’s okay. Those are just feelings and we can all get sad at some point. I don’t always have to fix those feelings and I don’t have to tell them to shove those feelings down. When my kids are scared, we can talk about why they might feel scared without me telling them they’re being ridiculous. And I can empower my kids by helping them understand that their feelings are just their feelings– they are meant to be acknowledged, but they don’t have to control you.
I can let my friends have their feelings. They can even be angry at me for hurtful things I did– even things I did unintentionally. Those are their feelings and it’s okay for them to acknowledge them and for me to be aware of ways my choices have impacted their feelings. I don’t have to try and fix my friends or own their feelings. I don’t have to be afraid of their feelings or responsible for making the bad feelings go away.
This understanding of emotions has been an especially important insight when it comes to my marriage. Marriage can be tough. In those difficult moments, a Big Feeling can arise. The Big Feeling will tell you, “You aren’t happy here. He doesn’t value you. You aren’t the same people you once were. Your life would be better if you left.” This Big Feeling can wake you up in the night, haunt you after a disagreement, jump out at you during an otherwise pleasant date night. In those moments you can choose to ignore the feeling, you can be afraid of the feeling, you can come to believe that the feeling is some sort of Inner Truth trying to guide you toward your bliss. Or you can recognize that it’s just your feelings. You can let yourself acknowledge the sadness of living in a fallen world where there are moments of intense loneliness even inside marriage. You can feel the anger of not feeling valued and let it remind you there are tough conversations you may need to have with your spouse about why you feel that way. And then you can move past those feelings.
I can also let my spouse have his feelings (although they also tend to come out as a desire for nachos. . . we may have a problem). I need to be able to hear about his anger or sadness without being defensive or feeling that desire to make everything happy again. I need to engage my empathy and acknowledge the reality of what he’s struggling through and let him get to his point of realization that his feelings are just his feelings. I need to be a safe place for him to vent those things.
My feelings are not the Holy Spirit. If they tell me to do something contrary to God’s word, then they are not doing me any favors. It is not some kind of denial of my Inner Voice or ignoring my Truth to tell my feelings that I acknowledge that they exist, but that I will not obey them. It is how we live as part of a loving community, turning the other cheek as needed, living a life of self-sacrifice, in our anger choosing not to sin, hoping others will give us that same level of grace and compassion.
Let’s face the reality– my Inner Voice is a jerk. My Truth and Knowing and Feelings point me in directions of self-protection and self-centered happiness seeking. I’m just done with the pursuit of happiness. When my life revolved around searching for the high of happiness, I was miserable. When I’ve let that die and instead decided to carry my cross in a world of suffering, I’ve found joy. Beautiful joy in the midst of the pain that exists for all of us. And happiness, too! You can’t escape suffering and you’ll never be more miserable than when that’s your expectation. Being a slave to your Inner Voice, a slave to following your bliss. . . it promises things it can never deliver. It keeps you locked in a game of trying to be your “truest You” without realizing that meaning is found in what you do for others, for the least of these.
I remember my dad telling me when I was in my teens that sometimes excessive self-focus is like peeling back the layers of an onion– you get to the middle and find out there’s nothing really there, just more onion. My Dad. . . not much of an inspirational speaker, but I think I’ve seen what he’s talking about. In my search for my Truth, I’ve found emptiness. When I’ve structured my life around sacrifice and love, I’ve found meaning. Even when it was hard. Even when the big feelings threatened to take me down. Even when I wanted to give up. Doing the right thing is its own reward, even when happiness isn’t immediately evident. As Dallas Willard puts it, “Feelings make excellent servants, but terrible masters.”
I think knowing yourself (your gifts, your limits) is important. Listening to the Holy Spirit is essential. Taking care of yourself through appropriate self-care is a necessity if you want to love those around you well. There are ways we have to invest in ourselves in order to be of use to the Kingdom, but I don’t think our feelings always have to be our guide and decision maker.
Whatever my feelings, I choose love. I choose joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, self-control. These are not just feelings, they are choices. They are the ways I respond to my circumstances even when my feelings would like me to go a different direction. Because after all, my feelings are just my feelings.
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