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I'm Frustrated -- I Wish I Could Trust My Feelings

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TheBeast

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It seems to me that, in a perfect world, we could trust our feelings. If something makes us feel happy, special, loved, at peace, contented... it's a good thing. If something hurts, that means that something's wrong and needs to be changed. Right?

And yet I somehow grew up with the belief that my feelings can't be trusted. It seems like every time I started to enjoy something in my childhood, my enjoyment was squashed like a cockroach. It got to where I felt guilty for being happy.

And it didn't help to hear all of these things preached at church from time to time: "If you ever feel a prompting to do something, do it; it could be God prompting you," followed later by the exact opposite: "There is no part of your self that is untouched by your sinful nature; your intellect, your emotions, and your will can all be corrupted, so just because you think or feel that something is right doesn't mean it's right"... coupled with, "In this world there will be suffering," and "I did not come to bring peace but division," and "Christ suffered, so don't expect life to be easy," and "If you're not suffering, then you're not in God's will," and "If you obey an authority that's kind to you, what good is that? Obey even those that are harsh, and you will be rewarded,"... contrast all those with, "Pain is a good thing; those with leprosy wish that they could feel pain, so that they would know when they're hurting themselves and stop it,"... So is pain something to be endured, or is pain a sign to do something different? I can't tell!

How about these: "If your brother has something against you, leave your gift at the alter, go and be reconciled to your brother, then come back and make your offering," contrasted with, "If you do not hate your father and mother and brother, then you can not be my disciple"? And then back to, "As far as is possible, live at peace with everyone."

I've spent an AWFUL lot of time trying to get along with certain people and failing. I keep going back and forth between wanting to make peace with them and wanting to get them the hell out of my life. I'm doing it again today; just when I've decided to cut them all off forever, I'm feeling another urge to try to contact a couple of them -- one who has never hurt me, but is close to one who has, and one who used to hurt me but has long since stopped, who I am convinced has grown up since then. ARGH! What am I supposed to do? I DON'T want to risk getting burned again.
 
Hi, Beast - Sorry to hear you're so frustrated. Having grown up shall we say, um, heavily churched, I very much identify with your quandries.

"That makes you happy? Don't do it."
"You feel good about (fill in the blank)? Well, you shouldn't. Pride is a sin."
"You're not happy? Not HAPPY?!? What makes you think you have any right to be happy? God doesn't care about your happiness at all, He only cares about your holiness!"
And of course all the being taught to love others, and seeing the total opposite played out...being told to stand up for what's right, but also receiving instruction to essentially be a doormat...yeah, I could go on for quite a while here.

The part no one ever taught me was setting healthy boundaries. Where's the line between being reconciled to your brother, and standing up to say, no that's not okay? Between submitting to an evil authority, and standing up for what's right? Between obeying/respecting your parents, and keeping them from harming you? Confusing.

I think where I really started drawing lines and trusting my feelings more was when I realized the damage certain people were doing to me, and I was allowing it. It's one thing for someone to hurt you inadvertently, or screw up and be truly sorry and not do it again, but it's another ballgame with people who are continually disrespectful, cruel, or otherwise toxic. Setting boundaries doesn't mean you can't still care about those people, but it does mean that the ways in which you and they interact may be limited (for example, dependent on certain behaviors). It's not easy to do, and sometimes it's painful for both parties, but people do need to realize that their actions may have consequences. What they do from there is up to them.

Here are some questions I have asked myself:
  • Why am I feeling the need to get in contact with these people? What is the driving force for wanting to contact them?
  • If I do get in contact with them, am I prepared to deal with the fact that they may not have changed since last time?
  • What good may come of having them in my life?
  • What negative things may come of having them in my life?
  • How might my contacting them impact their life?
 
My upbringing, with a father who had PTSD, caused me too, to learn to distrust my feelings totally. I can relate to much of what you said. It took me many years to get back in touch with the feeling part of me, and it's such an essential part...

For me personally the answer lies in connecting with my core, my intuition, through meditation. I came across the idea (for example expressed in books by Paul Ferrini and Ken Wapnick) that we have a core in us and an inner wisdom that we can learn to turn to. If we listen to that inner voice of our heart, it becomes easier to distinguish what to do and what not to do.

With regard to what they told you in church... Personally I like to think that only the messages about love were really Jesus' words, and the rest was made up by confused disciples and power-hungry church officials later on.
My personal idea is that the leaders of the main religions have turned the original message about love and sharing (which is the foundation of just about any religion as far as I can see) into dogma's that have little to do with the original message, and threaten with punishment if the dogma is not accepted. The whole power of the church seems to me to be based on fear, not on the real message of love.

I'm personally very inspired by the book A Course In Miracles (which some people would find total nonsense, I'm aware) but to me it's a very insightful source on the teachings of the Christ. It's all about universal Love and forgiveness. There's also 'The Letters from Christ' from Christsway. Both of these teachings might help to shed a very different light on the real message of 'the savior'.

Freya
 
I've spent an AWFUL lot of time trying to get along with certain people and failing. I keep going back and forth between wanting to make peace with them and wanting to get them the hell out of my life. I'm doing it again today; just when I've decided to cut them all off forever, I'm feeling another urge to try to contact a couple of them -- one who has never hurt me, but is close to one who has, and one who used to hurt me but has long since stopped, who I am convinced has grown up since then. ARGH! What am I supposed to do? I DON'T want to risk getting burned again.

It's hard to offer you advice in this respect... if not impossible....

Reading your words my thought would be that you're maybe not yet ready to get back in touch with those people. You may need to find more inner stability before you could do it. Maybe digest the events that hurt you further.
I too know this tug-of-war between wanting to make peace with someone AND resenting them terribly. With me, part of this has to do with still being sort of (emotionally) dependent on the person(s) involved. Still wanting to 'get along' with them, still wanting in some way their approval, their affection. So I'm trying to work on this need for approval and affection in myself. Also through letting healthier others in my present life fullfill those needs, opening up to the care and respect I CAN get from those around me today, as in contrast with my past.

No idea if this is helpful for you. Just wanting to say I understand your struggle.

Freya
 
A lot of these contradictions about the Bible can be understood better these passages are contextualized... don't read only part of the text but the whole in which it was written.
 
I too know this tug-of-war between wanting to make peace with someone AND resenting them terribly. With me, part of this has to do with still being sort of (emotionally) dependent on the person(s) involved. Still wanting to 'get along' with them, still wanting in some way their approval... Freya

I have this tug of war as well, also I want approval that everything is alright and that I didn't do anything wrong. I hate having that feeling, I feel like a little kid, so now that I recognize that I do that I'm not allowing myself to go for approval anymore, it is too easy for me to slide into old behaviour, even though I want contact I don't think I'm ready to handle it. Mostly I'd like to be able to lose the need for approval and dump the needyness and be able to have better relationships. The unfortunate thing about it is the guy I needed approval from was that he also needed to give it to feel good about himself, so it burst his bubble too.

I had a lot of religious 'things' that I had to live by, and I did, but it wasn't healthy for me, it was a control thing. I'm still struggling with the left overs because I can't really tell, until my T points it out that it's not realistic, I wasn't aware how these 'things' were stunting my life. See if you can figure out what makes sense, what's good for you to keep and what would be better if you let it go.

Heather
 
Thanks, Everyone

Thank you all for the feedback and encouragement. I wasn't really looking for advice; I was just venting my feelings a little. It helps to know that other people can be confused by what sound like mixed messages coming from the church.

I'm pretty convinced that Jesus actually said what the Bible says that he said, but that I just don't always understand what he meant. It's true, you can't take things out of context -- but I heard most of those sermons in my childhood, when I didn't know the context and wasn't old enough to think critically about things. All I heard was a sermon about submitting or sacrifice or suffering, and I linked it in my mind with the only thing I had ever experienced: abuse.

I never heard anything about healthy boundaries, either, until well into my adulthood -- and even then, it was in a book, not through a sermon or any other public, out-in-the-open event. I wish churches would talk about healthy boundaries; if I had ever heard a pastor say from the pulpit, even once, that it was OK to try to stop people from hurting me, it could have made a lot of difference in my life.

And no, I know that I'm not ready to get in touch with anyone now; it wouldn't be good for me or for them.
 
My Wife's Perspective: Emotional Emasculation

I shared this thread with my wife, and it hit her really hard. She realized that some of the people in my past had no capacity to feel anything good, because they believed that pleasure is sinful. She calls them "emotional eunuchs." She said that this must be one of Satan's biggest lies; if people can't be moved by beauty, then they can't be drawn to God's love. Even worse, instead of recognizing that they've been wounded and seeking healing, they think they're normal, so when they see someone else enjoying life, they try to make him be more like them, and they end up inflicting the same damage on him. Sharing any fun or exciting things about our lives with them is pointless. They can't appreciate it.
 
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