Human emotional expression has been given a ‘bad rap’, and violently discouraged, in most human cultures.
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to live in a world where other people
listened to how you felt,and trusted that these feelings were valuable?
Would you like to help create this world by spending time listening to your own feelings?
Would you like to help create this world by knowing how to listen to the feelings of others, including your children?
Are you afraid that if you love and value yourself, you will be betraying someone else who does not feel loved?
Are you afraid that if you let yourself get angry you are going to hurt or even kill someone?
Are you afraid that if you feel your fear you are really going to die?
Are you afraid that if you cry you will be humiliated?
Would you like to know how to feel all your feelings safely?
This website sets out to explain why emotional expression is at the core of our humanity and our life, if we are to live our life fully.
It also links you to articles that provide information and practical advice on how to connect deeply with your living, powerful, emotional self, and help others do the same.
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Feelings can be hard to feel, but they exist because you live in the real, physical world. Some feelings are responses to conflict (when you don’t get what you want or need) and some are responses to getting what you need, and feeling supported by the life around and within you. Your feelings help you heal from conflict, violence and injury, and evolve towards being a more centred, powerful person.
So, there is no such thing as a ‘negative’ emotion that should not be consciously felt by you. In fact, trying to permanently suppress feelings like fear and anger that have a genuine cause leads them to burst out inappropriately, ‘insanely’ and destructively.
This can make feelings confusing. If someone is angry at you for no reason, you may understandably fear and hate their anger. But it is not the anger that is the problem – it is the way it is being misdirected and unsafely expressed.
Your feelings tell you the truth about what is going on now, and what has happened in the past. Feelings that you have delayed feeling do not go away. They are desperate for your attention, and you will keep unconsciously recreating situations of conflict until you gain the courage to let yourself feel what happened in the past.
Feeling states inevitably change if you allow them to exist, and they teach you things about yourself that you need to know on the road to becoming a more powerful, self-loving person.
Suppressing our feelings is the deepest cause of the violence in our world. This is because emotional suppression disables our innate capacity to respond intelligently and powerfully to events in our life and to behave functionally. When we can’t feel, we can’t act sensibly to protect and nurture ourselves, others and the Earth.
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In 1996 the founders of Nonviolence Today, Robert J. Burrowes and Anita McKone, decided to put their feelings first, as an absolute priority. This turned into a research project and process of personal transformation that lasted 14 years and uncovered much new insight into human nature and psychology.
The process we undertook is described in ‘Fearless Psychology and Fearful Psychology: Principles and Practice’.
Further core learnings we discovered are described in ‘Why Violence?’
‘Putting Feelings First’ describes how to put feelings first in your own life.
‘Nisteling: The Art of Deep Listening’ describes how to listen to someone while they have their feelings.
‘My Promise to Children’ describes how you can nurture children so that they are encouraged to put feelings first throughout their life.
‘Punishment is Violent and Counterproductive’ explains why punishment is extraordinarily dysfunctional.
‘The Importance of Being Angry’ explains why listening to and expressing our anger is important if we are to become our truly powerful self.
‘Do We Want School or Education?’ explains why school is utterly destructive.
‘Expressing Feelings Safely’ describes how to feel and express your feelings without causing any harm to yourself or others.
‘Let’s Sing A Feelings Song (for kids)’ (audio)
More Articles
Click on the two ‘Articles’ items in the menu above to access other short published articles on the vital relationship between emotional suppression and insane and violent behaviours, and what can be done to change this.
2 October 2017
Feelings First 