Then, I did what my own inner spiritual guidance had taught me to do and I laid down, breathed deeply and felt my way into the pain, trying to tune into the pain rather than make it go away. A clear understanding of what was causing the pain came to my mind, which actually caused the pain to diminish and when I followed through with fixing what I realized was the cause (which was emotional by-the-way) it went away.

This is the same thing I’ve learned about emotions and about our body. The teaching that everything comes from our “head” and our “thoughts” is wrong. We also have a body and a emotional world, which are co-equal partners with the mind. When I try to ignore my feelings, they become more intense, when I try to tune-into and acknowledge them, I find wisdom and am able to transform them into a positive in my life.

A CoM consistently mis-applies spiritual truths to psychological issues, which Robert Johnson identifies as a mis-appropriation of levels. If you would like I can locate his exact work on that issue. I think it is on the “Slender Threads” DVD.

I never found the CoM to be very compelling, though a lot of people swear by it. I don’t agree with the idea that the real world is an illusion, or that emotions are problems in and of themselves.

In fact, neurology is showing pretty clearly that a lack of emotions can be disastrous to the health and social functioning of humans and other primates. We need our emotions; our social and intellectual intelligences require emotions, and emotions form a significant part of our capacity to learn and make decisions.

Rather than fight a losing battle with emotions — as if there is something wrong with them — my focus is to accept reality as it is, understand emotions as they are, and utilize the human skill of empathy to get as smart about emotions as is humanly possible.

When you pay clear, empathic attention to emotions, you can discover the most amazing things about yourself, other people, and human nature. Emotions totally rock!

Thanks for delving into this subject because it’s been something I’ve puzzled over, too. I also like what Terre had to say. I see the three aspects of our nature (body, mind and spirit/emotion) as being represented by the three chambers of the body (the head area, the chest cavity and the abdominal cavity). The emotional/spiritual area I call the world of the heart and see it centered in the chest cavity.

In short, I see the heart as a bridge between body and mind (i.e., the mind/body connection). I have used the idea that a feeling is a message arising from the body to the mind and an emotion as a movement of energy flowing from the mind into the body (into action).

However, I can see that sensation would be a better word to describe the feelings that are the body trying to communicate with the brain. So, we have feelings of pain, discomfort, tension, etc. which arise when the body is communicating it is having a problem.

I like your idea that feeling is being aware of emotion and sensation and that not feeling is being disconnected from them. Also, I wanted to share with you a book you might like to read. It’s called The Secret Teachings of Plants: The Intelligence of the Heart in the direct perception of nature. The author, Stephen Harrod Buhner cites research showing that the heart “thinks” in electromagnetic waves that permeate the body and broadcast into the environment and that the heart also picks up electromagnetic waves generated by other hearts (and even plants) and decodes this “information” for the brain through emotions and feelings. This may be a scientific explanation for empathy.

Just wanted to share as I’ve been delving into understanding this world of feelings for nearly 25 years and agree with you that we aren’t educated about our emotions, just told to deny, repress or control them.

Steven

I’d love to be able to organize all these data into a cohesive approach to our natural human ability to figure each other out … because right now, it almost always falls into the realm of the paranormal or the supernatural, and I don’t think that’s helpful any longer.

But grrrr! I can’t find the research program I need. Still searching.