Examine our Emotions

  Recognize   --   Identify   --   Examine   --   Release   --   Reflect  

Attributing

After you have the right name, it is key to accurately determine what caused it. Sometimes this is obvious, whereas other times emotions seem to "come out of the blue" or "for no reason".

Emotions rarely come with no triggers, but they may be unknown to us. A common explanation for emotions coming "out of nowhere" is that the emotion was present, but was only consciously experienced when there was space for it, like when doing a mindless task.

A mistake people make in this step is attributing the emotion exclusively to one thing.

• For example, say a man that just had an argument with his partner became enraged in traffic. In this step, we'd say that the anger was immediately provoked by the traffic, but the strength of the emotion is likely due to anger that is related to the earlier argument.

• Another example is due to old heart that was not released

Attibuting to moods

This is due to unreleased emotions that is occupying us

Attibuting to Previous Hurts

This is due to unreleased emotions that is deep in our soul and may go as far back as childhood.

Evaluating

This part is where we ask ourselves how we feel about having the emotion. We all have different answers to this based on our identity, culture, and comfort with certain emotions.

For example, most may feel guilty with anger but feel comfortable to be sad.

That means the intensity of the emotional experience just doubled because shame was now added to sadness. Basically, things can get really complicated here if we do not accept or value the emotions that we are experiencing.

All of our emotions are valid and have some value, even if it is just a signal that something is happening within us, or in the world.

Judgment can be reserved for our actions related to our emotions to a later stage), but spare the emotions themselves.

Validating

This is when we ask ourselves these question:

Examine our Emotions

• Once we have our emotions identified, then we need to examine them;
• Try to find the underlying thought that produced that feeling e.g. "I am always stupid".
• Dispute the thought with facts, Scripture, logic and common sense until you come up with a more functional perspective on the event.