Fear and Love: Gateways to Our Deeper Feelings

Close Connections 

Fear and Love are closely connected to many other emotions – all of them, in fact! Emotions are indicators of our state of being, whether that be fear or love. They are a gateway to our awareness of deeper feelings. They emerge at the threshold between our subconscious mind and our conscious mind to reveal the signs of suppressed or expressed energy. For example, suppose something happens that causes us to feel anger. If we take time later to reflect on why we felt that way, often we blame what happened for our emotional reaction when, in reality, our anger is an expression of our fear (such as a perceived threat). Anger is communication so when we keep the discomfort inside, it will come around again the same way. When we fail to acknowledge our discomfort with it, it recedes back to our subconscious mind, waiting to emerge again.  

When we look at positive and negative emotions as indicators of whether our beliefs are accepted or challenged, we can move beyond asking, “Why was I angry?” to “How was my core affected by this threat?” Utilizing this thought process allows us to take personal responsibility for our emotions:  

I didn’t need to become angry, but I did. How could I respond to that type of fear the next time that would create a better outcome for everyone? 

We communicate our embedded beliefs and perceptions directly through our emotions. For example, if someone says, “You’re fat!” you have a choice to believe them, or not. If you believe they are right, but you don’t want to be fat, and are not ready to evaluate your beliefs about it, you will become angry that they had the gall to point it out! You’ll feel vulnerable and exposed by their comment whether you agree with them or not. Your fear about the truth and how it makes you feel draws out emotions such as resentment, anger and self-loathing. Over time, your perception of your weight can change: You can decide to love yourself as you are so that the next time someone makes a comment, you are not hurt by it. You’ve changed the way you feel about your physical appearance, or maybe you’ve decided to let their comments roll off your back because you just don’t want to be angry with that person.   

Our point is that we do feel emotions, but we can control what we feel when a situation occurs that stimulates our emotions. When someone says, “I don’t want to feel that way,” addressing the underlying beliefs will help them react differently when an emotion arises. By changing our beliefs which became attached to those moments, we can change the feelings that emerge. The next time someone makes a comment about your looks, you can laugh out loud, because you make a conscious choice for how to respond to their words. You acted to deprive the anger of a place to rest in your mind. 

Classroom Conflict 

This is doubly true in our perception of other people. Ben provided an example of his daughter who frequently experiences conflict with a school mate. They are both on edge waiting for the other one to push their buttons, with no grace given regardless of a real or perceived slight. It seems that any word, gesture or look results in retaliation or one-upmanship, resulting in classroom disruption. The other students stare and maybe think, “What is going on with you two idiots?” and begin to feel unsafe in the same space. 

Your fear about the truth and how it makes you feel draws out the other emotions. 

Each of the two children believes the other one is “out to get me” and the only way to end that cycle is to change their belief, and to realize they are both insecure and hurting. Ben’s challenge is how to explain it to them and help them understand the emotional dynamics of the scenes. The children are not mortal enemies, but they have emotions based on what they believe about the other one. Remember, emotions are the place where our beliefs meet our circumstances and generate either positive (validated) or negative (threatened) feelings about the situation.  

In the classroom, it isn’t just the two students involved in the conflict who are affected. Other students may become uncomfortable as they witness these scenes and have emotional experiences based on their own beliefs. They know that certain activities will occur in the classroom related to teaching and learning, then suddenly the rhythm and harmony of their interplay is disrupted. 

Adult Antics 

The same is true when adults are together – think about yourself at a party and two people start having an argument. Their voices get louder, and other conversations around the room cease, your friends feel uncomfortable. This isn’t the right place, in your judgment, because of your beliefs about public displays of extreme behavior. People shouldn’t be fighting at a party! On the other hand, you believe people ought to resolve their conflicts, so you’re torn about how to react. You’re feeling stressful but suppress your anxiety, hoping they’ll just stop. Your fear is paralyzing.  

Later, your analysis reveals that you weren’t upset that they were fighting, just that they broke the unspoken social contract about fighting at a party! Maybe, Lynn added, you are afraid that the fight will bleed over onto you – that you’ll get caught up in the emotion. You may fear for the safety of either or both people and others in the room. Ben offered a hypothetical situation – maybe you made a comment that generated the conflict they expressed! Maybe you care about them enough that you would not like to see their relationship under duress.  

The goal is to think about how you feel, and why – and choose how to perceive it and react. 

The interplay of those thoughts spins up our emotions – and you think you feel sad or uncomfortable because they are fighting. But that isn’t it: That kind of thinking just makes them the scapegoat for your feelings. You’ll think there’s nothing you can do about it, so you decide to just move on without working on the core feelings. You become trapped in the inertia of negative emotions. You’re not feeling the way you feel because something happened, you feel that way because of how you perceive what happened. The goal is to think about how you feel, and why – and choose how to perceive it and react.  

Both Sides of the Coin 

The same is true for positive emotions – “I love you because you do things that I like, so do more of that so I can keep on loving you.” If the other person fails to do whatever you like, you’re ready to ditch the relationship. That’s the mental fallacy of binary thinking we talked about in a previous blog which leads to narcissistic behavior. This is the belief that every action must be demonstrative, and earned, so I can get away with anything I want to do because it gets me what I want. I only give positive attention to you when you perform the way I want you to, so now you believe you must be a sycophant to me and now we’re in a death spiral. Self-esteem is gone, and we’re trapped in an abusive relationship. 

Lynn shared that the word narcissist is used to judge others often especially on social media. A narcissist behaves the way they do because they have a need they want met by someone else. If you are interacting regularly with someone who demonstrates narcissistic behavior, it is a sign that you are co-dependent. You rely on them for safety or emotional security (or to feel worthiness) so you buy into their attempts to fulfill their need. Neither one is a bad person; they are both hurting people, acting in fear energy. One is afraid that absent the adoration of others, they have no self-worth. The other is afraid that unless they act in a way to elicit adoration, they have no self-worth. These are two separate and distinct paths, but both fear the feeling of worthlessness.  

Our discussion of codependence continues in our next blog, where we give examples of people who think they are doing the “right” thing but may be acting on misaligned intentions. For an individual consultation, please reach out to us.