Feelings, Nothing More Than Feelings

Last weekend, Paul and I spent an amazing weekend at Pismo Beach at the Marriage Advance sponsored by our church.  Amazing guest speakers - Danny and Sheri Silk kicked my bootie a couple of times.  I needed a bootie kick!

Danny shared about feelings.  That the only thing that I can do, is tell you about me.  I can't tell you about you because only you know you.  Is this confusing yet?  I can only tell you about how your actions make me feel.  It's not my job to pass judgement on your actions.  So instead of saying, "You are such a jerk and you don't even care about me"  I would say, "I feel hurt and sad."  I take away my judgement of jerk-dom and his level of care of me.  When I make judgement, it sets Paul (or whoever) on the defensive.  He now has to defend his character and his level of care of me and the fight is ON like Donkey Kong.  If I tell him how I feel, he doesn't have to form a defense and we can really start to work on the real issues. (side note: saying, "I feel like you are a jerk" is not really a feeling.  If you can insert the work "think" into your feeling statement and it makes sense it is an opinion not a feeling.  I feel sad vs. I think sad  or I feel like you don't care vs. I think you don't care)

It made so much sense!  One problem, I am so very good at passing judgement and so very bad at expressing my feelings.  Why?  I don't know.  Probably something from childhood.  I want to be able to say how I feel but it is embarrassing to me.  I feel uncomfortable and awkward. (wow, I did it, a feeling)  I would rather just tell you my opinion of you.  I just had revelation: It's about control.  (Serious that popped in my head when I typed the last sentence about opinion)  I feel control over you with judgement and opinion and if I open my heart and expose all those feelings, I am no longer in control.  I am vulnerable.