Your Emotions Are Your Wise Guides

Instead of thinking of your emotions as irksome things to be controlled, consider them wise guides who have something to teach you about what matters to you deep in your heart.

There’s a certain amount of wisdom in your painful feelings. They tell you what matters to you. You don’t feel sad, angry, afraid or upset about things you don’t give a damn about.

Imagine that I am a very clever wizardy type, top of my class at Hogwarts, and I could do an amazing spell which means you feel no sadness, fear, anxiety, frustration, impatience or anything else you don’t like (eat your heart out, Hermione Granger).

But the flip side of this spell is that you can’t feel joy, happiness, love, contentment, pleasure or any of the stuff you do like. What would you choose? Most people tell me that, if that’s the choice, they don’t want my weird spells. Most people don’t want a life devoid of all feeling. What most of us do need, however, are better ways to manage those feelings so they don’t get in the way of us living the life we want.