This week, I had an image shared more than 15,000 times on Facebook. It brought 2,600 new members to the Beating Trauma community and I am extremely grateful. While the picture was beautiful, I think the quote stirred many people. It wasn’t my quote. The quote came from Iain Thomas, who is a popular author and blogger. ““Never apologize for how you feel. No one can control how they feel. The sun doesn’t apologize for being the sun. The rain doesn’t say sorry for falling. Feelings just are.”
This quote resonates with me because I am tired of apologizing. I am who I am. I feel what I feel. And honestly, I think many can relate. But there were others who were not quite sure about its veracity. On larger pages, I noticed some comments that illustrated the common misperceptions about feelings. Several people suggested that feelings were to be controlled. One extreme comment referred to unapologetic feelings as leading to terrorism. In this case, there was a clear misunderstanding between controlling feelings and controlling actions.
There were others who ventured in to the debate over whether or not thoughts can control feelings. There is much debate about this concept. I have been pondering this for years as I have worked through my own trauma recovery. And I have learned so much. So today, I am going to be bold and tell you the answer.
The feelings come first. The thoughts come second.
There is a reason why this is hard to figure out. We have been taught to tune emotions out. We don’t pay attention to our body. And after trauma, we take it to an extreme by dissociating. But nobody is telling us to stop thinking. Thinking is considered the most critical aspect of living in our world today.
So while we are supposed to live in our bodies and use our thoughts as a tool, we live in our minds and use our bodies as tools.
It comes as no surprise that our constant attention on our thoughts has us convinced it works the other way. And there are thousands of programs out there focusing on changing our thoughts. Even many of the teachings about the law of attraction erroneously focus on thoughts. But if you have pent-up emotions, you already know that doesn’t work. You have probably tried it to no avail. I know I have.
If you have been reading my blog for a while, you may be wondering why I write about thoughts so much when feelings are where it’s at. That’s a fair question. There are two answers. First, thoughts are much easier to write about. Describing feelings is challenging especially when I have only recently learned to express emotions. Second, and far more important, tuning in to our thoughts can tell us about our feelings. Let me explain.
When I wake up in the morning, I usually have a high level of emotional activity in my body. I haven’t dissociated yet. I am not triggered at that exact moment (usually), so it allows me a few genuine moments of awareness without really trying. In those moments, my thoughts will tell me a story.
- If I wake up in the morning and immediately search the previous day for some example of embarrassing behavior on my part, I am feeling shame. When I realize that, I can sense the shame in my abdomen where it likes to live.
- If I wake up in the morning and start worrying about how I will make it through to the day, I am feeling my old friend, anxiety. And for me, anxiety is a lack of agreement between my inner parts. In other words, it is my baseline state. If I can stay present and journal the concerns of my parts, this dissipates.
- If I wake up in the morning and I am resentful toward someone for negatively impacting my current life, I know I am feeling anger. I usually feel anger in my throat because of the years of silencing. If I can give voice to the anger through journaling, it dissipates.
- If I wake up in the morning and think nothing will ever be okay, I know I am embodying hopelessness. This often accompanies anxiety. And this is the most important feeling to recognize because it may lead to suicidal ideation. If I can stay aware that these thoughts are not about right now, I can come through it much better.
If I can stay aware, I always find the thoughts are not the cause of the feeling. The feeling is old. It comes from past trauma. And the thoughts are simply trying to make sense of it. The body feels one way, it sends messages to the mind, and the mind creates. That is what the mind does. And if we don’t recognize this, the mind will create all day, feeding the emotion. And that can make for a bad day.
So we must use our thoughts for clues about the body. But we can’t take them as truth. And we can’t believe thoughts will “fix” our emotions or body. They won’t. There is only one thing that will “fix” emotions. We must feel our emotions to heal. But we must feel them without attaching thoughts to them. We must dive deep in to our emotions without apology. When we do this, we will learn that our priorities have been mixed up for most of our life. And we will come home to our bodies where we belong.
If you want to build awareness of the interaction between your own thoughts and feelings, consider my one-on-one survivor guidance sessions.
Thank you Elisabeth, I have always known this for my truth, but find it hard to explain this to anyone. I feel happy that others are starting to write about this, Healing Trauma etc had an article today. I resonate with your articles they seem to just make sense to me. Everyone I know in my circle believe the opposite to be true, they can’t understand why I don’t ‘get it’. They say just change your thinking and you can do anything, well I’ve been’doing that’ for 20 years and it hasn’t helped me to be do what I’m here to be do. I am 62yo and have been “working” to improve myself to feel like I belong and normal, for 20 years but I don’t. I can’t believe I have just written all of this as I’ve never made my thoughts known to many let alone on a public forum. Thanks for your articles Elisabeth
I am so glad you wrote that here. I will have to check out the other article too. I love that it is gaining momentum and support. We need to accept this as truth so we can heal.
Totally agree with everything you’ve said. For me, something like cbt or dbt can temporarily help to build resources but it doesn’t *resolve* the things that those resources are needed for. So you learn to live a life of tolerance instead of a life of freedom. Experiential-based work is what’s needed to let those incompleted situations resolve so that the body can let go…and then the mind can let go.
I’ve come to see that there’s such a gap in understanding just how it is to live like this, which makes sense. Until you can pause and be open enough to see someone else’s reality without your own defences activating, you’ll never cross that divide. No matter how good intentions are.
Xo
Exactly. Cognitive work can be great for building positive coping. But we can’t stop there. Or it will be almost impossible to maintain. I like your phrase about “a life of tolerance”. Perfect.
This is so beautiful, eloquent, comforting, and freeing. I can DO this ~ you gave me exactly the tool I need, and it won’t take up any room in my bag yet it’s totally portable. Thank you.
Thank you! I love that metaphor! It really is the most portable tool.
Hey!
I was searching an answer to what comes first thoughts or feelings and I came across your article and I was satisfied by your views; but as I read further I realized it can be the other way round as well. According to cognitive therapy, thoughts comes first and then feelings, what are your views on that?
Hi Kavina, I disagree with the cognitive therapy approach. I think we only come to believe that because we are too dissociated to feel the emotions when they come. “Thinking happy thoughts” can lead to a putting a mask over our pain and never fully addressing it. That said, once the emotion has started, we can choose to stop the cycle of emotions feeding thoughts feeding emotions by becoming aware of our thoughts and how they are impacting our overall well-being. We can come to understand the thoughts as false representations of our past emotional pain, which can help to end the pain in the moment.
Your comments were very interesting, especially where you wrote, “When we do this, we will learn that our priorities have been mixed up for most of our life.” It seems that this contradicts your idea about “The feelings come first. The thoughts come second.” My question is, “Are priorities feelings or thoughts?”. Reflecting on this shows that a priority is a group of words that form a thought. For example, “Everyone should go well for me or it is disastrous. Therefore, I will strive to make everything work out the way I want it to so I can be happy.” As your sentence on priorities imply, the failure to experience the realization of our priorities (or beliefs about how life should be) is what causes distress. That emotional distress is created by us as we tell ourselves something like, “Oh no, this circumstance will prevent me from being happy. This is awful. I have to fix this or my life will be ruined!” This thought produces the unpleasant emotion. You are absolutely right, the priorities (based on our beliefs about how life should be) have to be re-evaluated and made to be more in line with reality. But make no mistake, it all started with wrong thinking and right thinking is the cure. In fact, once you change your beliefs/priorities your unpleasant emotions will simply resolve themselves and disappear. If they don’t, then you haven’t really changed your mind about life.
I disagree with the idea that our feelings will go away when we change our thoughts. While we can certainly help ourselves by building awareness of our thoughts, we must bring our attention to the body and the feelings there. They are feeding our thoughts. And they won’t go away by “thinking differently”. We must learn to feel. Cognition is not where the healing is.
Completely agree with your view on this topic. I’ve been working to open and get back into my body the last 10 years and spent thousands of hours sitting with sensations and feelings. Along the way I’ve battled with and wondered where thoughts come from and it always led me back to the body. It took many years of work to start to grasp that thoughts are a direct result of what’s happening in the body. This article was a great reminder for when I lose awareness and get out of balance with my body mind relationship. Thank you! You provided some great examples that I will be using as a guide in my daily work. Also agree that changing your thoughts is a downstream activity that doesn’t heal or resolve the source. Thanks.
Thank you Greg! It sounds like you are doing great things to reconnect with yourself.
Hi Elisabeth,
Stumbled on your great post, thank you. However, one thing that confuses me is how you don’t distinguish between emotions and feelings, but label them as if they are one and the same and not deriving from different parts of the body. Could you elaborate a bit on why this is, please?
Hi Maiken, The distinction wasn’t necessary for the message of this particular blog post, but I do go into much detail in my technical resources for my clients. Honestly, the breakdown of all emotions, feelings and where they reside would be an extensive document.
Hi, I would gladly like to answer your inquiry in a very simple way, with Elisabeth’s permission. I have also been working with this topic for 3years now and came accross with Elisabeth’s post, that BTW, I totally love and am really glad to see that there are many others interested and agreeing with it.
This is how I explain the difference between emotions and feelings. Emotions are the physical manifestation of our feelings. For example, when we feel sad or depressed one of the possible physical manifestations may be to cry, so emotions, are more of a physical or behavioral nature, while feelings aren’t. Hope this helps!
If we look at the physiology of the human body we see there is a connection between the Gut and The Brain. This feedback loop is 80% from the Gut to the Brain and 20% from the Brain to the gut.I first came across this statement from the brilliant Nutritionist Robert Crayhon . So if the gut is the home of our feelings and the brain the home of our thoughts its clear to see that feelings are the giant deep ocean currants that are actually generating the tidal waves ( in this analogy , thoughts). Thanks for the great article!
Thank you Clare. I agree. The body has so much more to tell us than we realize.
I too was looking for what comes first thought or a feeling? And found you!!!!
Thank you so much. I think I will recover from dissociation now if I close the gap.
The basic answer to what is first is this:
Babies feel first so why would not adult?
Feelings come first but for me… Now, I cannt tell how I feel until I can tell one thought. Then I will tell you the exact feeling and where in the body. I need to learn how to feel first and tell it though.
That is such a good point about the babies. Everything needs to originate from the body. But once we have shut down the mind/body connection with dissociation, it can take time to build our awareness of it.
Can you help me understand the statement, “Fake it til you make it.” in relationship to what you are speaking about? I find that if I fake being happy, I gradually become come happy… or is that really a fake happy? Thanks for your help.
It is a fake happy. It is a mask. It can be useful in situations when we need to get things done in the real world, but if we never accept and address our real emotions under the surface, we can’t find our grounded happiness.
I am glad to have found this blog. Yesterday I was wondering which comes first. Glad to read these comments. Susan
I’m glad you found it too Susan!
This is a gem of knowledge. Thank you. <3
Thank you Nadeera!
From an evolutionary stand point, with good evidence that your body and mind’s primary goal is to protect you from external threat, could be said that it works in this way… substantial perceived threat > recoreded in the subconscious to protect from further danger > if the threat is unresoloved, the subconscious sends a message to the body that it isn’t safe or that something is wrong > the body then posts this as a negetive thought to the concious brain?
Yes. I think it is more that the conscious brain interprets the body’s reaction. But essentially, that sounds right to me.
Okay. So I’ll have a bad feeling due to an external circumstance. Something happens which when it happened in my childhood meant danger.
Now. I know I am not in any real danger. So my brain, reacting to this feeling, creates a scenario that could mean danger.
Example: I win the lottery. My brain says lovely. But also you might get cancer and die now. What about that? Did you ever think of that?
Now the rational thing to do is to say: shut up brain. This is a good thing.
But instead I think: no. This won’t happen because. Or that’s unlikely. Or I’ll do a google search. Basically I’ll act like the irrational thought is real and freak myself the hell out.
Until I get really upset. Realise I’m being nuts. And then I’ll move on. Of course after I’ve ruined being excited about the promotion.
Now next time something good happens I’ll do the same. Only a different irrational thought. Possibly more clever than the last.
So I know I feel this way because as a child happiness, good news, good times, etc were all just fake news and complete distress followed (parents alcoholics). So I know it isn’t true NOW. Now no one will take away the toy I was just given.
So I am trying, when I think these things to just not engage in the false fear. Just not give it a new narrative. Which is helpful. Because it’s nonsense after all.
But then, how do you release the underlying emotion? Isn’t it merely a habit at this point? Would it not be sufficient to allow one’s brain to carve out new pathways? Ones that say: hey. Something good. Brilliant. I’ll enjoy that.
Wouldn’t practicing this a lot eventually erode the habitual response from childhood?
This combined with allowing the original feeling without adding a narrative. And simply sitting with it?
Also I have come across your blog because I couldn’t quite believe thoughts always proceed feelings. To me it seems like my feelings are, and then they find thoughts to justify their existence.
I could not agree more with your last statement. That is exactly what I have seen in my own work. The key is to recognize the thought as explaining the past emotion. That allows us to not get caught up in it (slowly but surely). Then we can sit with the fear that drives the thoughts without getting overwhelmed and distracted by the thoughts. I recommend writing from the underlying fear to facilitate release. It will likely communicate the original beliefs coming from childhood.
Hi
This is all very fascinating and incredible helpful right now so I was wondering if you might be able to elaborate on how to write from the underlying fear to facilitate release. I’d really love to feel release so how do I go about the writing that you mention please?
Thank you for this article. It seems like it’s making utter sense to a lot of us!! Finally!!
Hi Jeannette, Writing from fear is helped by building awareness of the mind chatter and grounding into the body. We need to look for the message in the emotion itself. I work with clients to teach this strategy. Please email me any time to set up a free half-hour call and I’ll discuss it more with you. beatingtrauma@gmail.com
Hello.
I just can confirm this.
Since I was a child I was trained, like most people, not to feel, react or use my intuition. This is toxic. And yes there were several traumas too.
The thing is, I went to therapy for 6 years and addressed several times that my biggest problem is that I feel fear and panic without any logical reason like all the time.my therapist was very enthusiastic about teaching me that thoughts come before feelings and we have to figure out which thoughts are that. I told her, I can barely think in moments of panic or great fear so I dont know what she means. She smiled at me like I was dumb and said there has to be something I am thinking. I said no. Most of the time not.
I explained to her that I feel before I think. And often there was an horror image coming up I could not control.
She was obviously confused in that moment. But still told me what I say was wrong.
I got angry and told her that it is my every day life experience and it cant be wrong.
She just laughed and explained some psychological theory to me which made no sense.
Honestly I wasted 6 years of my life with this person without making any progress with her techniques.
So I started going through my feelings alone by using energy therapy like reiki healing, buddhist healing meditation and mantras from sikh anx hindu tradition.
I still do it today.
What helped me the most was seeing a traditional healer from Siberia who did a powerful ritual on me.
That’s what actually broke through the toxic patterns of my life.
Now I am refusing therapy due to a lack of empathy of therapists in my region and I only rely on my intuition which came back very strong. I do what I feel is right now for me because my life is starting to make sense for me again. I ignore the haters, they dont mean well.
So feeling yourself is the key to be your authentic self. And yes, the healing is painful. But once the most pain left your body, you start being well again.
True healing is only for the brave. Cause you will face everything you ever rejected about yourself. But it’s worth it.
I am sorry you had that experience, but I am glad you stuck to your truth despite that invalidation. You are right. True healing is only for the brave.
I am very intrigued by your perspective on healing and how CBT is helpful, but not sufficient. Can you elaborate more on what you mean by “we must learn to feel” and “we must feel our emotions to heal.” How is this done?
Feeling our emotions happens through grounding and emotional journaling. It is important to practice bits of body awareness, mindfulness and emotional express on a daily basis so we can teach ourselves how to feel. This takes any cognitive work to a new level.
Hi
This resonated with me, I experience high anxiety in relationships with men, nothing untoward has happened to cause this in the present moment. Currently working with a trauma therapist who advises using my breath to slow down and connect with my body.
Strong emotions come up mainly grief.I was the good girl compliant, people pleaser, I’m always looking for someone outside to validate, rescue me.
Fear I have to give myself up, be responsible for another’s feelings needs.
I have seen numerous therapists who ask who do I want to be/ feel or put labels on me Codependent, Cptsd, Borderline traits, splitting.. all very damaging.
There is a very wounded inner child who is terrified of life, making a decision, trying to get it right, manipulating others to take care of her, lots of shame .
Yes. Follow that wounded inner child and their feelings. They have the story behind all these thoughts and interactions. They are searching for what they never got as a child.
Hey Elizabeth Loved your article and the way you explained things and I would love to hear your input for my situation,
So how could one trust that feeling when one never been trained to do so? or should I trust a feeling over thoughts and facts?, being in a Relationship with someone who has done nothing against you and being together for a while but been having a feeling that I cant explain just a feeling that I shouldn’t be with that person its like not clicking anymore but my logical brain fights it on how things could get better and this and that and I end up listening to the brain facts instead of the feeling do you think that’s the right approach
Hi Andy, It is so important to connect with those feelings. There is something from the past that is being triggered in the relationship. There is a pattern that is feeling familiar to one of your inner parts. As you connect with the feeling, you can get the message that comes with it. It may be that there is an innocuous similarity. Or it may be that you are missing a red flag that your mind is explaining away. But the feeling does need exploration.
Hi , I liked your article . I had this question as well from past few months .I was also not fully able to agree with CBT . My feelings does play important role . I woke up in morning and feel at times with no direction and what to do in life . I feel I am at mid-life crisis. Although I am working on my plans and things to do. My coach advised me to observe those thoughts but also feelings,memories and images associated with them. I meditate or journal at many times it helps. But when I am in middle of important meetings , personal life conversation if negative thoughts pops up. I want to break the chain of them immediately before I spiral myself down on it. As , I do not have time for journaling and meditation. So, how to make sure that in such situations I am aware of what I have to do in order not to spiral myself down in negative hole.