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Key points
- The capacity to distinguish between feeling and action is an important part of being a stable adult.
- Distinguishing between feelings and behaviors helps patients forgive themselves for aggressive feelings.
- Making choices about how to behave maximizes the chances of developing and maintaining healthy relationships.
The capacity to distinguish between feeling and action is an important part of being a stable adult. Many people take undue responsibility for their emotions, as though feelings were behaviors. Often there is a stated or implied should: “I should feel this, not that.”
They have the mistaken belief that people can, and should, be in control of their feelings. That idea often leads to self-contempt and condemnation. We cannot choose our feelings, but we can make choices about our behavior.
Learning this distinction is a central part of psychotherapeutic work. It helps patients accept themselves more; it empowers them to make choices about how they want to behave, and it enables them to assert their needs and wishes in a way that maximizes their chances of developing and maintaining healthy relationships.
A few months ago, my husband and I traveled to Hawaii. We started in Kuai and stayed in a B&B with a beautiful view, but in order to get to it, we had to take a hard right turn off the main road and go over a lava bump that scraped the bottom of our car.
The owners of the B&B did not warn us about the problem, so we had accepted the rental car agent’s offer of a convertible with low clearance. Each time we arrived or left, we winced at the scraping sound beneath the car. I felt angry that the B&B owners had not warned us about the problem when they confirmed our reservation.
When we left Kuai, we flew to the Big Island. We were careful to not get a convertible. But based on our previous experience, we decided to drive to the condominium where we were going to be staying to make sure there were no other problems.
When we arrived, we found that there were four apartments with a small, shared parking area that had a steep incline at the entrance. We knew immediately that we would not be able to negotiate parking our car if there were three other cars already there – especially in the dark.
“There’s no way we are going to be able to park here at night!” I said to my husband.
“Take it easy,” he replied, “I can do it."
“No, this is ridiculous. We can’t stay here. We have to find another hotel,” I insisted.
“We’re not going to find a hotel for tonight that’s close. It’s too late,” he said.
“No,” I raged, “I’m going to call the managing agent and tell her this is not acceptable and ask for something else.”
I called the managing agent and she acted shocked and said, “No one’s ever complained about the parking area before. But I will try to get you some other place.”
I knew that was a lie and had to constrain myself from yelling at her. I was right to refuse the condo with the mini parking lot, but I would not be right if I yelled at the managing agent.
For many years I confused feeling anger and expressing it. If I yelled at someone and regretted it later, I concluded that the problem was that I was “always angry” or “too angry.” But that was not the problem, my analyst had told me.
“There is nothing wrong with feeling angry when you’re disappointed or hurt,” my analyst had said.
“But if I tell the person I’m angry, they just move away from me and avoid me,” I responded.
“The problem is that you try to suppress it and you lose control over it,” she said. “If you were more accepting of it, maybe you’d be able to express it in a manner that didn’t feel lethal.”
Sitting in the car feeling rage at the managing agent, I thought of my analyst. I imagined her smiling at me and saying: “You are right about the parking lot. You shouldn’t stay there. But don’t yell at the managing agent when you tell her that.”
I was able to be my own self-analyst and say to myself: “You have a right to be angry; you have a right to refuse the rental, but you don’t have the right to yell at the rental agent.”
I smiled to myself as I dialed the managing agent’s number. I felt calm and resolute. I was going to be firm about getting a different place to stay, but I was in control of myself – I was not going to yell at her. As it happens, she called back in a few minutes and offered us another condo apartment with a large parking lot.
