Episode 48 -- August 15, 2020

How are you feeling? It's a common enough question--especially in these days of coronavirus and quarantine. But not everybody knows how to answer it. If no one ever asked us how we felt about things when we were young, we probably didn't learn how to recognize and describe what was going on inside us. In this excerpt from his book, Feed Your Head: Some Excellent Stuff on Being Yourself, Earl Hipp reminds us that being human always involves emotions. An emotional vocabulary can help us tolerate and talk about the intensity and discomfort that come with big feelings. Without this capacity, we will find all kinds of ways to escape our emotions by shutting down or smoothing over what's happening inside us.

It has been edited for brevity.

Feelings are our emotional/physical response to what we think about and to what goes on in the world around us. Everybody has feelings--you can't stop them. But we're all different, and we respond to our feelings in different ways. See if any of these common responses sound like yours:

• We may not realize we are having feelings. If, as we grew up, no one ever asked us how we felt about things, we probably didn't learn to recognize and talk about what was going on inside us. In some families, it's not ok to talk about how you feel about some--or even any--subjects. People who have this background are simply not able to identify and express what they're feeling. They often say they feel "funny," or bummed out.


• We might go away from our feelings or pretend they don't exist. Events happen in our lives that stir up some pretty intense feelings. If we are not able to tolerate and deal with the intensity and discomfort that come with our feelings, we may find ways to "shut down" emotionally. Some of us will find it safer to just put our attention elsewhere or somehow cover up our feelings. At other times, we may just try to look tough, to pretend nothing hurts or bothers us.
  Feelings are what make us human, however. They happen whether or not we acknowledge them. Denying that we feel angry, sad, scared, or any other way just sets us up for bigger problems later. The emotional pressure will build and build. At some point, something has to give.


• We can be aware of our feelings, name them, express them, and learn to talk about what we are experiencing. Feelings are a kind of information. They help us understand ourselves better. Feelings can also help us know how to live more successfully in the present. For example, if you feel fear, it might mean that something dangerous is about to happen--and that's a good thing to know! So in this case, you'd want to experience and understand your fear. In this same way, recognizing and experiencing other emotions can help you make better choices.

Ways to Escape Feelings
You can stay distracted from your feelings--from fear, hurt, anger, or any feeling that makes you uncomfortable--by overdoing just about any activity. If you are uncomfortable with your feelings, but things keep happening to stir them up, you'll find you have to do more and more to avoid facing your emotions. And you may not even realize how focused you are getting on your "escape" behavior.

The following list includes some of the ways people escape feelings by putting their attention elsewhere. These behaviors are--or can become--destructive and take over your life. If any of these situations sound like your life, don't be afraid to ask for help. Keep looking until you get the type of help you need. There are support groups made up of people who help each other recover from similar problems. You may find joining one that's right for you will be a big help too.

• Running or other physical activity for hours at a time, day after day.
• Eating, not eating, binging and purging, or just worrying about food all the time.
• Regularly taking hours to clean your room to keep it spotless, even when it's already clean.
• Thinking about other people's difficulties all the time: your friend's problems, your friend's friend's problems, and so on.
• Always wearing headphones and constantly listening to anything other than what is in your own head and heart.
• Sleeping all the time, especially when the rest of the world is awake.
• Too much television or other screen time.
• Taking baths or washing your hands every day, morning and afternoon or hourly.
• Using drugs to get high, low, sideways, or generally detached from your body and life.
• Repeatedly leaving: leaving the room, leaving home, leaving town to avoid the hard stuff. Wanting to be alone more and more of the time.
• A preoccupation with death, suicidal thoughts.
• Thinking constantly about any one thing.

My Feelings
Being responsible for feelings means we take responsibility for what happens when we get out of control. If you are in a down and out, nasty, blue funk about your life, you have some responsibility for your impact on the people around you. If a friend says, "Boy, were you in a bad mood yesterday, I didn't like being yelled at," you need to own up. You might say something like, "You're right, I shouldn't have taken it out on you, and I'm sorry."

It is very hard for our relationships to work well when we don't know how one another feels. Sharing our feelings with someone tells them what is going on inside us. If we don't tell, we won't really know what is going on or where we stand with each other.

A safe rule for sharing a feeling with another person is to start out by saying, "I feel..." Using an "I" statement like this keeps you from blaming the other person for your feeling. For example, "I feel angry when you are late " is better than "You make me angry when you are late." The first statement says I am in charge of how I feel, and that your behavior (being late) is having a negative effect on our relationship. The second statement says the other person has power over my emotions and their being late messes me up--that I am a victim.

The great part about having feelings is that they are all yours. What's more, you can learn to be more in charge of how you feel if you want. It is ONE part of your life where you can make decisions about what you want for yourself. Then, if there are people who seem to be out to MAKE you feel bad, you can choose to ignore the invitation. It's great to be in charge of your own life in that way.

About the Author
Earl Hipp is a writer, speaker, and consultant. He works with businesses, schools, parent groups, and other organizations to help people manage life's challenges and get along with each other better. He has written Fighting Invisible Tigers - A Stress Management Guide for Teens, and three pamphlets for Hazelden's Step Meetings for Young People series.

© 1991 Text, Earl Hipp; illustrations, L.K. Hanson
All rights reserved.