The Language of Emotions: What Your Feelings Are Trying to Tell You

by Karla McLaren

Create a New Relationship with Your Emotions for Insight and Healing

Your emotions contain brilliant information. When you learn to welcome them as your allies, they can reveal creative solutions to any situation. For 35 years, empathic counselor and researcher Karla McLaren has developed a set of practical tools for the real-world stresses of family, career, and the quest for personal fulfillment. On The Language of Emotions, she presents her breakthrough teachings for a new and empowering relationship with your feeling states.

How to Harness the Energy of Your Emotions

Your emotions--especially the dark and dishonored ones--hold a tremendous amount of energy. We've all seen what happens when we repress or blindly express them. However, there is a powerful alternative.

On The Language of Emotions, you'll learn to meet your emotions and engage with them to safely move toward resolution and equilibrium. Through experiential exercises covering a full spectrum of feelings from anger, fear, and shame to jealousy, grief, joy, and more, you will discover how to work with your own and others' emotions with fluency and expertise.

Your Direct Link to Inner Wisdom

When we relate to our emotions with respect and authenticity, we can directly access our innermost wisdom, unfold the deepest parts of ourselves, and heal our most painful wounds. The Language of Emotions gives us a much-needed resource for self-understanding and freedom.

Karla McLaren is an award-winning author and pioneering educator who has specialized in the study of emotions as an integrated system for more than 35 years. She is the author of five books and six audio courses on self-healing.

Program Highlights

Hours of practical insights and guided exercises for partnering with your emotions for wisdom and healing
- How to overcome addictions, distractions, and unresolved trauma--the three primary impediments to emotional ease
- Using the energy of anger to protect and restore personal boundaries
- Step-by-step guidance in the five skills of the empath (someone skilled in reading emotions)
- How to balance your "quaternity," a metaphor for the interplay of mind, body, spirit, and emotions
- Honoring sadness as a source of release and rejuvenation
- Joy, the natural response to beauty and communion

Genres: Psychology, Nonfiction, Self Help, Emotion, Mental Health, Personal Development, Health

432 pages, Audio CD

First published May 28, 2010

About the author

Karla McLaren, M.Ed is an award-winning author, social science researcher, and pioneering educator whose empathic approach to emotions revalues even the most “negative” emotions and opens startling new pathways into the depths of the soul. She is the founder and CEO of Emotion Dynamics LLC.

Karla’s lifelong work has been focused on the creation of a grand unified theory of emotions, which she has developed through her work with survivors of dissociative trauma, through her own lifelong experience as a hyper-empath, and through extensive research into the social and biological sciences.

Reviews

[Frank Calberg · Rating 5 out of 5]

Takeaways from reading the book:

What are emotions?
- Pages 30, 162 and 253: All emotions are true information.
- Page 43: The word "emotion" comes from the Latin "emovere" which means to move.
- Page 56: Emotions move information. In contrast, the logical intellect translates, organizes, stores, and retrieves information. Genius dances where the two meet. Emotions move this truth - often unwanted truth - from our instinctive selves.

How do we welcome emotions?
- Page 30: Avoid repressing emotions. Why? 1. They come back later even stronger. 2. They develop into something else, for example illness.
- Page 43: Welcoming emotions, which come to you, and letting them flow naturally through you is the foundation of handling emotions skillfully.
- Page 50: Ask and answer yourself what emotions you are feeling. Example: Is this emotion fear? Is it shame? When you do this, you become able to feel and think about emotions consciously. That helps you develop self-awareness.
- Page 71: Allow yourself to feel emotions you are feeling. That helps your psyche to flow.
- Page 74: If we can welcome our flowing emotions as necessary - like the water element in our fully functional psyches - we won't need to go into problem-solving mode.
- Page 146: When your emotions are welcomed and honored, they move easily and quickly.
- Page 150: When you complain about something by allowing your emotions to tell it like it is, your body releases stored up tensions, and you become focused. That leads to joy.
- Page 162: Create space that enables the truth of the emotions to come forward and be acknowledged.

Happiness
- Page 359: By chasing after happiness, we create the most joyless lives imaginable.
- Page 359: People are terrible at predicting what will make us happy and unhappy.
- Page 362: Successful people allow themselves to flow between work and play.
- Page 364: Welcome your happiness on its timetable, not yours.

Contentment
- Page 366: Contentment arises, when you work with all of your emotions in healing and honorable ways.
- Page 368: Contentment arises, when you have done good work. Welcome and honor it.

Joy
- Page 369: You feel joy, when you feel you are one with something or someone.
- Page 370: Joy arises naturally and spontaneously during times of full-bodied wholeness. All parts of you are awake when you feel joy.
- Page 370: Joy is closer connected to contentment than to happiness.

Anger
- Page 41: Anger helps us set boundaries.
- Page 115: Anger can take the form of rage, fury, hatred, envy, jealousy, apathy or shame.
- Page 115: When anger arises, it signals that healing is underway.
- Page 167: Anger asks two questions: 1. What must be protected? 2. What must be restored?
- Page 168: The goal of anger is that noone gets hurt without reason.
- Page 176: Anger arises arises as response to real threats that are important to you. In a way, getting angry is a way of honoring the event or person which made you angry.
- Page 177: Your anger and your personal boundary are intimately connected.
- Page 179: Finding the reasons for your anger helps you find solutions.
- Page 180: An angry person is a caring person. Why? Because anger runs in direct proportion to concern.
- Page 180: People, who are regularly angry, do not know how to communicate their concerns in healthier ways. They are usually our deepest humanitarians and greatest strivers for peace. Their hearts are usually in pain, and they can be depressed underneath their anger. So honor them for investing their energy and be kind to them.
- Page 191: When you are unable or unwilling to deal with your anger, boredom arises.
- Page 240: Anger sets your boundary and protects your sense of self.
- Page 257: Confusion arises when you cannot or will not accept your fears.

Shame
- Page 199: If you are not guilty about something, there is nothing to be ashamed of.
- Page 200: If you welcome appropriate shame, you will avoid saying or doing the wrong things.
- Page 201: Authentic shame places authentic brakes on your impulses. Example: Your hand reaches out for a cookie. You realize you don't need it and walk away. After, you feel strong.
- Page 203: When the emotion "shame" comes forward, immediately ask yourself or someone around you these 2 questions: 1. Have I done something wrong? 2. If I have done something wrong, who or what have been hurt? Then, if necessary, apologize and correct mistakes you have made. Your happiness will then arise naturally, and you can move forward as a smarter, stronger and more honorable person.
- Page 204: If you feel your shame is intensifying, find a quiet place where you can calm your body and give your mind peace.

Fear
- Page 36: When we need it, our fear scans our environment as well as our memories and helps us respond effectively to new or changing situations.
- Page 36: When your fear flows nicely, you will feel focused, centered, capable, and agile. Your free-flowing fear brings you instincts, intuition and focus.
- Page 36: If you can rely on fear's calm, listening, sensing stance, it will help you read people and situations empathically.
- Page 115: Fear can arise in several mood states. Examples: Fear, worry, anxiety, confusion or panic.
- Page 115: The channeling task for the fears is to make conscious movements that restore a sense of focus, resiliency, resourcefulness and intuition.
- Pages 6 and 136: If we kick fear out of the window, we lose our focus and our intuition. Without fear, we would be endangered at all times.
- Page 237: Fear is our brilliant and innate capacity to act, move, react and change our behavior based on the input we receive.
- Pages 239-240: Fear becomes activated when you encounter change. Fear then helps us maintain focus. This often means that you have to slow down or stop what you are doing. Thereby, fear gives you time to breathe, gather yourself and your resources.
- Page 241: If you listen to and honor your fear, you will have access to the information that helped your ancestors survive and reproduce.
- Page 249: Actors say the only cure for stage fright - one of the most universal fears - is much preparation.
- Page 252: If we continue to reject our fears, we will continue to cycle into worry and anxiety.
- Page 257: Confusion arises when you cannot or will not accept your fears.
- Page 379: Stress is a fear-based readiness response that prepares you for change. It's a normal and healthy reaction.

Sadness
- Pages 34 and 136: Sadness helps us let go of things that are not working anyway. Sadness helps you release uncomfortable things such as muscle tension. Sadness calms you, helps you relax and bring you back to yourself.
- Page 86: If a baby feels sad and is crying, say "You feel really sad. Things are hard now." Usually, the baby will stop crying much faster if you just let the baby feel what he / she is feeling, i.e. if you simply support the baby in the way he or she feels at that moment.
- Page 163: If you give yourself over to crying, your sadness will move through you and cleanse your soul.
- Page 295: When you let go, sadness takes you to your authentic self, to the person you are.
- Page 303: In true and honored sadness, loss is followed by a sense of quiet and relaxation.
- Page 304: Crying is the all-purpose healing balm of the soul.

Other research from the book:
- Page 123: Love is deeper than emotions and unaffected by any emotion.
- Page 123: Emotions come and go. Love is stable and endures all emotions.
- Page 228: When we repress the hatred in others, we increase the pressure in their psyches.
- Page 387: Before we had formal language, we communicated using, for example, sounds, body position, eye contact, gestures, touch, and emotions.

[Laurie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book should be required reading for anyone getting a degree in psychology or counseling. I was terribly disappointed when I got my degree at the lack of information about emotions in the teaching of psychology.

It does not work to repress or blindly express emotions, so what do you do? Karla McLaren showed me how to make friends with and honor all of my emotions even the "negative" ones and learn to work with them in ways that break down old worn out patterns and create new pathways of reintegration, resolution and equilibrium.

Karla taught me how to work with anger, fear, shame, jealousy, grief, joy, contentment and more and gave me tools that have transformed my life.

Now, when I feel a strong emotion, instead of being overwhelmed and confused, I have a whole basketful of tools to use to face the situation and deal with it. I am befriending my emotions rather than ignoring them or being overwhelmed by them.

After years of affirmations and positive thinking, it is refreshing to welcome the whole village within me including all of my emotions and my "shadow side" and learn how to receive the messages that my emotions are giving me.

I know I will be using the tools in this book for the rest of my life.

[Mark Henderson · Rating 3 out of 5]

I learned things from this book, but I'd be hesitant to recommend it as an introduction to emotional intelligence. Why? McLaren emphasizes metaphor: Emotion is "water", physicality is "earth", etc. When listening and participating in the exercises, one focuses on one's "aura". While McLaren presents this in a very secular manner, at times it felt too woo-woo to follow. For me, a very concrete analysis of emotions and how they play into our lives is more effective when it comes to growing closer to my own emotions. For this style of learning (my own), I almost always recommend "Emotional Intimacy": https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...

McLaren emphasizes very important concepts: For example, that emotions don't just "happen" to us; we shouldn't be blaming or shaming ourselves for our emotions, that emotion is neither good nor bad, but a tool. This was covered more in depth in "Emotional Intimacy", but I appreciated McLaren's reminder throughout her book.

[ZI · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is incredibly well-written and deep. It revolutionizes the way that I view emotions and it offers an alternative paradigm to the profound social issues that we encounter, from systemic institutions to mental illness to environmental destruction.

McLaren posits that the reason society is in such a state of distress is because people have stopped listening to, honoring, and taking the time to understand the underlying messages that their emotions are conveying. This seems to be an age-old cliche - "sure, I'll be more mindful," someone might sneer - but once you are able to truly open your eyes, you'll see that everything McLaren says has a basis in truth.

As a culture, we are taught that emotional responses, especially the negative ones, are considered bad and destructive. Hence we are instructed from a very young age to oppress them. This serves very well to maintain social order, but it often prevents the individual from exploring certain parts of his or her self, leading to more frustration and confusion in the long run. Understanding the messages that your emotions are conveying is essential to understanding who you are! However, due to our repressive responses, we often don't know what the emotions are trying to say.

Reading McLaren's book is a great start on helping the individual unpack what their emotions indicate. While each individual's personal journey will be different, this book promises to serve as a guiding light for the ultimate result.

[Dasha Spivak · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was beautifully written and I learned a lot more about emotions and how to react when in certain situations. Some chapters could be triggering for others to read, i know I had to skip one of the chapters because it’s a tough subject to read.

Well done karla!!

[Lisa · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book puts forth some interesting premises regarding how our society misunderstands emotions. I think most of her observations have merit, but they could have been stated with less repetition. I also wish there was a bit more depth behind her explanations of the healthy and appropriate way to handle emotions. As someone who tends to stuff them away, I did not find enough info here to really understand how to begin welcoming them.

[Sue · Rating 5 out of 5]

I will be returning to this book. Karla McLaren's insight is quite unique. I gained a lot of insight and help with understanding what anger is and how to let it flow me to joy out the other side. Quite the learning experience.

Her techniques for learning to understand your emotions on an energetic level, and to release them, are excellent.

A book for re-dipping.

[Buck Wilde · Rating 5 out of 5]

Karla McLaren is a science witch. She turned all her trauma (and there was a ton) into a modern shamanic initiation, and Monomythed her way back from oblivion with the whole supernatural boon to share with mankind. She borrows handfuls of woo from all sort of conflicting traditions, then underscores it with neuroscience while taking pains to avoid the revelation that "these are visualization exercises and not necessarily actual magic".

But that's crucial. If you don't believe in them, they don't work. She's a neo-Freudian, even if she doesn't realize it and certainly wouldn't identify as one, and her "empathic" therapeutic tactics focus on plunging elbow-deep into your own psychic morass and pulling out all the dark-and-uglies we spend so much time fleeing, then throwing them into a spotlight for scrutiny and processing.

Modern psychology is big into CBT and positive psych right now, which frequently amounts to "don't look at it and it'll go away". That's good advice for low-grade psychological disturbances, little waves that build into a periodic panic attack, or Seasonal Grouchiness Disorder strains that can be ameliorated by walking around the goddamn block once in a while.

That's not what Science Witch is here to deal with. She's talking about the intractable neuroses, the ones lodged in your unconscious like a particularly defiant wood tick. We treat them like curses and avoid them as any other superstition, which prevents us from ever looking at them head-on.

You can't laterally process grief, or despair, or whatever other madnesses you've got hitchhiking in your head. It doesn't happen through osmosis. Science Witch gives you a bunch of incantations to unite your warring mentalities into one cohesive unit, then arms that unit, gives it the resources it needs to really get into your own head, name your demons, and expunge them.

And in so doing, you discover they're not really demons. Every feeling serves a purpose. They're there for the same reason pain is. It's a warning system that something's wrong. Now, due to a general Discontentedness with Civilization, there are only a handful of emotions that are deemed socially acceptable, and our efforts to repress the others allow them to grow more powerful and have a sweet personal cloaking field like the Predator. Was it not the Lord our God who once said, "he can't hit what he can't see?"

Anger is there to protect your boundaries.

Depression is there to let you know something about your current way of living is drastically wrong FOR you.

Sadness is there to clean out the cobwebs, to slow you down and help you deal with whatever it is you'd like to skip out on dealing with.

Jealousy and envy are there to let you orient yourself with regard to the rest of the community, and understand what you want vs what you think you want, and sometimes show you how to get it.

Suicidal ideation is there to let you know something has to end right tf now, and it's something either so pervasive or so well-hidden that the only way you can think to address it is ripping out the breaker box and letting the whole house go dark.

These are big, scary issues, and they're wrapped around the self-concept like a nerve cluster around a rotten tooth. Nobody's excited about getting it yanked, but like it or not, the bastard has got to come out. Science Witch gives you the Novacaine and the pliers, but you gotta face the mirror on your own.

A phenomenal book, if a touch too witchy for me to recommend in my professional life. I hope this catches on more than it has so far. It's not particularly evidence-based, but I like the Jungianism inherent in fighting fire with fire vis-a-vis mythic/magical thinking, and I think a lot of good could be done.

[Nancy · Rating 2 out of 5]

The perfect reader for this book would someone who has been a devotee of something very squishy -- Joyce Meyer's books? -- and are still miserable and looking for something different.

So I am not this reader, yet I still found useful: her insistence on the value of paying attention to one's emotions, and balancing one's emotional self with the intellectual, physical, and visionary selves. (I am intrigued but don't quite get that last one.)

Alas reading the text was like listening to a well-meaning but rambling friend go on and on and only veryyy slowly getting to the point.

Plus, "loneliness" wasn't in here.

[Celeste · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm about 1/4 of the way through this book and it is already helping me. For years I have felt like my emotions were wrong and that I was weak because I couldn't control them. So I grew increasingly angry and anxious. But now I can see why I'm having those emotions and embrace them. The book is very well written and easy to follow! I highly recommend this book to everyone!

[Nicole · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really liked this book, she covers a lot of emotions as well as their purposes and how we can harness each one and take vital information from each of them including really uncomfortable emotions that many of us would rather not deal with. What I didn’t like about this book was some of the more esoteric energetic ways of speaking about emotion. It’s just a bit hard to understand and apply if you don’t already think in and understand that type of language. Overall, I learned a lot of valuable information from this book and enjoyed it.

[Dewo Wicaksono · Rating 3 out of 5]

I DO LOVE AND GET THE MESSAGE OF THIS BOOK but I didn’t finish as I reckon there are so many concepts/perspectives for just one topic and I found it incoherent. Still don’t understand the water, air and other elements in this book

[Molly · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the most educational, eye-opening, and epiphany-inducing books that I have ever read.

Before reviewing this book, I would like to mention another famous book "emotional intelligence" by Daniel Goleman; it's the first book introducing the idea of EQ and making a compelling argument about its importance in our daily lives. After reading emotional intelligence, I was utterly convinced about the importance of EQ, and I was determined to improve mine, in particular, my emotional awareness and emotional regulation skills. Yet Daniel Goleman didn't really have concrete applicable details about how to improve emotional intelligence, and even though I was super motivated and was looking around for resources from which I can learn, I was at a loss in terms of detailed knowledge about our emotional makeup and concrete steps to take, until I found this book.

Karla Mclaren dives deep into the details and subtlety of every emotion and essentially draws an intricate map of her understanding of our emotions, and then detailed the function of each emotion at different intensity and how to work with them. Her understanding of emotions is very nuanced and subtle, for example, she points out happiness is a broad family of emotions, the mild form of happiness is calm, peacefulness, the extreme form of happiness is ecstasy and exhilaration, and there are different flavor of happiness as well, and the same goes with all other emotions. She makes many other interesting points and claims, some of which I am very suspicious of (because it's just really new and different from everything I have known about this subject), yet it somehow always strikes a chord in me such that her claims feel right at a guttural level (an emotional level ? :)). As I practiced what she taught, I become more convinced because I gained immense benefits and insights. An example of that, is the chapter about anger. She describes anger as our guardian and protector, if we feel angry, we need to channel anger to have better boundaries. That is such a powerful insight, because I happen to be trying to be more assertive and better at setting proper boundaries with people, and anger (or the milder version of anger, annoyance) turns out to be like a beacon in the sea showing me when something is amiss with boundary and some actions need to be taken. Likewise, the chapters about sadness and grief taught me to let go of what's not serving me anymore. She describes grief as "deep river of the soul" where we completely let go of a person, or an idea, or a relationship that is dead, and she said it's a sacred and powerful emotion that deserves to be treated as so. Having just gone through a breakup, this chapter greatly helped me to be touch with my grief, to express grief appropriately and adequately, and to honor myself through the process. I never had a breakup that's nearly as spiritually fulfilling and meaningful as this one, because I was fully in touch with my grief and actively working through the depth of it with a lot of active grieving (one of the most powerful experiences is through dance where I moved my body in such a way to experience and express grief in every muscle and movement), just like submerging my soul in a deep river, and I came out feeling like I have learnt a lot and have gone through a transformation that wouldn't have been possible if I haven't grieved the way I did.

This brings me to another aspect of the book that I deeply appreciate: Karla doesn't "judge" emotions as good or bad, and she points out (correctly) all emotions are valid and around for very good reasons. For example, fear sharpens our awareness and focus, sadness helps us to release and relax, joy helps us celebrate, anger protects us from boundary violations, etc. This is such a breath of fresh air and a direly needed message in the modern society where any other emotions besides what's in the happiness family are not welcomed. If we are sad/fearful/angry/jealous etc, we are told by the culture, friends, family or ourselves to become happy one way or another, as if happiness is the only socially acceptable state to be in. Instead, she is teaching us to honor and respect each emotion, and to garner the benefits and functions of each emotion, because we evolved for millions of years and we retain such an essential trait for very good reasons. I have since learnt to let go of the idea that I need to be happy all the time, and instead I am practicing everyday to just notice my emotional state, and to accepting of whichever state I am in, and to learn what these emotions are trying to tell me about my life, and what's the most beneficial response to them. I have since gained immense insight into myself and have greatly improved my "emotional regulation" skills, exactly what I hope to gain after reading Daniel Goleman's book.

Finally, Karla is an amazing writer with such nuanced and playful finesse in her use of language. I thoroughly enjoyed her language as well as the insightful content with which she is trying to convey. I really highly recommend this book, it's truly life changing to me.

[Greta · Rating 2 out of 5]

While the author gives credence to the importance of allowing all of your emotions to be experienced equally and processed without judgement, she recommends some borderline airy-fairy rituals to enable you to do so. I'm all for setting boundaries and visualizing positive outcomes but the way she drones on and on about "creating sacred space" and "imagining setting fierce boundaries" in which you "burn your contracts" in order to rid yourself of non-useful beliefs and establish flow with regard to your feelings... Well, yeah. Each emotion is dealt with in pretty much the same way so going over each one separately seemed redundant. I did find her idea of "conscious complaining" to be particularly compelling, however, and plan in future to make good use of it myself.

[Rick Sam · Rating 3 out of 5]

I took this book to help me understand, name, feel emotions better. There were lot of stories but I didn't think, I got the best of it. I think, I sensed lot of esoteric ideas for emotions.

The author does admits that most of the content in the book is personal anecdotes, no case studies.

Part II is the meat of the book, I think understanding purpose of each emotion, would help us to navigate life better.

I didn't think this was the best book on emotions. I am systematic in my approach and did not find it the best due to personal anecdotes. I would recommend to people who like New Age, Esoteric thought.

Deus Vult,
Gottfried

[Eric Army · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you want to read about how to understand and interact with your emotions-- the second half of this book is a stellar, one of a kind book.
If that's your goal, I'd skip the first half, unless you *really* want to read about the author's journey as a new age empath & her personal trials she went through.

FWIW, it's basically two books. I'd skip the first half, but keep the 2nd half handy for future reference.

[Anaid · Rating 5 out of 5]

WOW!
It is a MUST for everyone!!
The importance of knowing and honoring each of the emotions and what our soul tries to tell us each time they appear. This book made me realize the lack of information I’ve grown up with about the emotions and the importance of listening and validating each of them. “ ALL EMOTIONS ARE TRUE” ; “ THE ONLY WAY OUT, IS THROUGH”

[Gigi · Rating 5 out of 5]

GREAT book!! I'm doing this one cover to cover, but it's a great resource book as well. It describes just what it sounds like - it tells what feelings are telling you. Has good exercises for increasing awareness as well. REALLY really good!!

[Julie · Rating 5 out of 5]

a must read

[Sarah Cupitt · Rating 3 out of 5]

I blame my TBR list for why I'm reading all these book types rn

blah blah learning to work with your feelings rather than against them can transform your relationships, your work life, and your understanding of yourself.

notes:
- When you feel joy, it's highlighting what truly matters to you. When you experience anxiety about a relationship, it's alerting you to examine your needs and boundaries.
- sadness helps you process loss and change, while anger alerts you to violations and injustice. Denying these emotions doesn't make them disappear — it only pushes them deeper, where they can affect your health, relationships, and decision-making in unconscious ways
- Aisha noticed her heart racing whenever her partner dismissed her concerns about their future. By paying attention to this emotional signal instead of suppressing it, she initiated an honest conversation.
- start by taking a moment to ground yourself. Plant your feet firmly on the floor, take three deep breaths, and scan your body from head to toe. Notice any areas of tension, any temperature changes, or subtle movement. These physical clues help you identify what you're feeling, even when emotions seem tangled or confusing.
- Creating a calm environment supports emotional awareness, too. When you want to tune in, find a quiet space where you won't be interrupted. You might dim the lights, play soft background music, or wrap yourself in a comfortable blanket. These simple actions help your nervous system settle, making it easier to experience complex feelings.
- Support yourself through intense emotions by moving your body.
- When Asher felt overwhelmed by a mix of emotions after ending a long-term relationship, he tried to stay grounded by focusing on physical sensations he was feeling. Noticing his tight chest, churning stomach, they identified a blend of both relief and grief. Acknowledging these feelings without judgement helped him move through these complex emotions gradually.
- Strong emotions often feel threatening, leading many people to shut down or push them away. Just acknowledging their presence can feel like a kind of failure, as if their mere existence is a sign that you’re doing something wrong
- it's crucial to distinguish between strong emotions and depression. While intense feelings naturally ebb and flow, depression tends to create a persistent emotional numbness or darkness that doesn't shift with circumstances. In other words, it isn’t about feeling sad, or unmotivated, or ashamed, but about not feeling much at all.
- approaching with curiosity instead of judgment can be transformational
- The key lies in responding to strong emotions, rather than reacting to them. Create a small pause when intense feelings arise. Take three deep breaths. Notice where the emotion lives in your body. This space allows you to choose your response thoughtfully instead of being carried away by the feeling's intensity.
- Sometimes emotions amplify each other, too, creating overwhelming combinations.
- When David felt persistent shame about a past mistake, he practiced self-compassion. Rather than trying to banish the feeling, he acknowledged it while reminding himself that all humans make mistakes.
- Start by establishing an emotional check-in routine. Set aside time each morning to notice how you're feeling, perhaps while drinking your morning beverage or during your daily commute. (yay i do this now)
- She started taking five-minute breaks between meetings to ground herself and process any lingering emotions. When she noticed them building up anyway on particularly challenging days, she took a 15 minute walk. This simple practice helped her approach each interaction with renewed presence and clarity. (so kinda like me on weekly or so runs)
- As your practice grows, build a supportive community for your emotional practice. Share your journey with trusted friends or family members.
- And you can deepen your emotional vocabulary through regular journaling. (also do this)

quotes:
- If we ignore and repress an emotion, we won’t erase its message—we’ll just shoot the messenger and interfere with an important natural process. The unconscious then has two choices: to increase the intensity of the emotion and present it to us one more time (this is how unresolving moods or escalating emotional suffering may be activated), or to give up on us and stuff the emotional energy deep into our psyches
- cry as often as you need to. It’s the all-purpose healing balm of the soul
- Therefore, dissociation and distraction function as survival skills that offer a sense of distance when we’re overwhelmed by stimuli

[Karen · Rating 5 out of 5]

This the best book of several I’ve read about emotions. I appreciated McLaren’s explanation of the gifts offered by each emotion and her insistence that no emotion is negative. The book is an engaging read with dozens of practical suggestions of how to work with each emotion rather than either suppress it or be led by it.

[Rachael · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the e-arc. This is a thorough and technically exploration of emotions so is not an easy read but it was fascinating and engaging,

[Rachel · Rating 5 out of 5]

I just finished this book on Fri and I highly recommend it!

I read the book, (not audio!)

[J.D. Steens · Rating 2 out of 5]

I have mixed reactions to this book.

First, the good points. McLaren resurrects emotions and gives them their due. Emotions are messages from our instinctive selves, she says. Hence the “language” reference in her title. Emotions flow through “Your every walking and sleeping moment,” adding that “They bring energy and information forward.” While more implied than not, emotions for her reflect Freud’s energy model, and his theory of the id. Energy is not just movement. It is directed movement. It’s loaded with inner meaning vis-a-vis the object-other, and it underlies our cognitive (conscious) approach to the world.

Given the importance of emotions, McLaren is excellent on the sad state of understanding when it comes to the question, “What is an emotion?” On this point, she writes: “This seems to be a very simple question, and yet psychologists, behaviorists, neurologists, evolutionary biologists, and sociologists cannot yet agree on a clear definition.” I don’t know why she inserted “yet” into that sentence. Emotions have been around forever. Emotion researchers have their own perspectives, but they vary across the board, to the point that it’s fair to say that there is a substantial incoherence on this topic.

In Western cultures, at least, it’s understandable that there’s a lack of discipline when it comes to understanding emotions. Emotions are highly disvalued vis-a-vis cognition and the near Stoic emphasis on managing emotions (i.e., denying their presence and role). McLaren’s emphasis in this book is empathy - which she defines as the ability to read the emotional states of others - and the following, long but excellent, quote indicates how culture buries this essential trait: “Though empathy is a normal human ability, most of us learn to shut it off or dampen it as we acquire verbal language. Most of us learn by the age of four or five, to hide, squelch, or camouflage our emotions in social situations. We catch on very quickly to the fact that most people are inauthentic with one another - that they lie about their feelings, leave important words unsaid, and trample unheedingly over each other’s obvious emotional cues. Learning to speak is often a process of learning not to speak the truth and attaining an uncanny level of pretense in most relationships. Every culture and subculture has a different set of unspoken rules about emotions, but all of them require that specific emotions be camouflaged, overused, or ignored. Most children - empaths one and all - eventually learn to shut down their empathic abilities in order to pilot their way through the social world.”

When it comes to her systematic formulation of a theory of emotions, though, there are problems. Her big concept is empathy, a relatively recently coined term that now seems overused as a catch-all word for a good emotion. Our ability to read emotions presumably means we will be sympathetic in addressing or being in tune with the other’s emotional state. I’d argue that that’s far from true. Given Darwinian variation, many are - it fits with Darwin’s tribalism theory - but many are not. McLaren argues that we’re all “empaths” until culture knocks it out of them, yet elsewhere she undercuts that point by stating that “some have very active mirror neurons,” suggesting that there’s an innate variation factor at work. Some have more capacity for empathy in her sense than others, but it’s even more likely that a good part of humanity is more self-oriented, id-driven beings who do not care all that much about someone else’s emotional state unless it directly affects their interests or they have to, instrumentally, feign interest and concern. Then there’s the flip side of the empathy piece that some theorists have noted: The ability to know what makes others tick is used to manipulate them, i.e. the opposite of a sympathetic reaction to the other’s emotional state. And then there’s Hume’s observation that we are approbation and disapprobation beings. We care about what others think as such relates to our self-interest and status within the group.

Hume’s observation bumps into a larger point about our emotional makeup. McLaren in the long quote above states that culture teaches us to mask our emotions, but she doesn’t explain why this would be the case. A good many - again, there’s Darwinian variety involved - are focused on their own self-interest, which includes being a group member in good standing. Yet they have these gnarly, id-driven tendencies that put them at odds with others and the group. So, of course they have to mask their emotions.

McLaren refers to emotions as reactive entities that are provoked. That’s correct of course, but it’s only one-half of the story. The larger question is why do we react as we do to provoking situations. This leads to the even broader problem with McLaren. While no doubt she’s put a lot of thought into this subject, there is still in my view the lack of a solid grounding for her theory of emotions. As biological beings, we are need-driven beings. We need nurture, security and sexual mates, that this inner state of need explains our emotional interactions with the world. We literally emote - move outward to get what we need from the world. We literally emote to ward off threats, harms to what we have or what we need, including our capacity (power) to seek and our power to resist threat or harm. In other words, we are provoked by +/- objects-others because of our needs and what we don’t want, and these emotion states prompt outgoing and defensive behaviors (her terminology often conflates motivating emotions with behavior that flows from such emotion states).

Seen this way, the fundamental emotional drivers are few - and somewhat follow Spinoza’s theory: In desire, we move outward to get what we need and desire not (sort of an “anti-desire”) what we don’t want (I’d say, this would be anger and fear to ward off threats and harm (McLaren makes a good point about defensive anger). When we are successful in our seeking and resisting, there is “joy,” and when not, there is sadness. These are broad conceptual categories that cover intensity states - degrees of joy, degrees of sadness - that McLaren also notes. Depending on how they are counted, the fundamental emotions come down to these five emotion states with all other emotion states and words being derivative.*

There are other factors that fit into this framework that are related to the role of cognition (are love/hate a cognitive evaluation of what we like or don’t like?); the “here-now” emotions versus dispositions and conscious choice based on underlying emotional values (again, Hume), and the role of cognitive sorting out of conflicting emotional states, including those that “should” override others.

“All emotions are true,” McLaren writes and we run into huge problems when we ignore them. This leads to her “empath practice and finding ways to channel the flow of emotions to get to a constructive result. It’s somewhat akin to Jung as far as I can tell - a rebalancing of the forces within - but to be honest, this part of McLaren’s book didn’t resonate, particularly her views on love not being an emotion, but, it is, rather, this: “Real love is a prayer and a deathless promise: an unwavering dedication to the soul of your loved one and to the soul of the world. Emotions and desires can come and go as they please, and circumstances can change in startling ways, but real love never wavers. Real love endures all emotions, and it survives trauma, betrayal, divorce, and even death.”

*Reorganized in this way, there’s some overlap with McLaren’s conceptual scheme, though because of her views of emotions as reactive, she doesn’t deal with outward actions based on need (desire [Spinoza], “pain” [Schopenhauer]), though arguably envy bumps into desire. Anger-fear are defensive (anti-desire) emotions, and stress and resistance are variations of these; jealousy is a subset of anger, and panic and terror are subsets of fear. Of course, happiness, contentment, joy are all variations on successful interactions; grief, depression, and sadness are all variations on unsuccessful interactions. I would add, though, that there’s an important distinction here between the initiating emotion of desire from the end state emotions of joy and sadness, with joy resulting in the quieting of energy, and sadness leading to the festering of frustrating or fear-based energy because seeking or resisting actions have not been successful. Boredom and apathy are special cases of emotions - what happens when one lives in comfort, and there’s too much free energy that separates the self from the inherent meaning when one is focused on survival and basic well-being.

[Elizabeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

audiobook checked out from the Library 11/13 list.

borrowed from Holly Lyons
ordered from lib 11/03 also on 6 discs
paperback borrowed from library, 1 Feb. 2014

Table of Contents

Preface ix
PART I Restoring Your Native Language

1. Introduction
3 (6)
Creating a Conscious Life

2. My Empathic Journey
9 (16)
The Difficult Beginnings of Empathy

3. Troubled Waters
25 (14)
How we got so Confused

4. It Takes a Village
39 (18)
Surrounding Your Emotions with Support

5. Reviving your Essential Nature
57 (20)
Making Room for your Central Self

6. Avoidance, Addiction, and Awakening
77 (14)
Understanding the Need for Distractions

7. Unintentional Shamans
91 (22)
The Role of Trauma in Soul-Making and Culture-Building

8. The role of Emotions in the Resolution of Trauma
113 (10)
Water Will Carry you Home

9. The Steadfast Promise
123 (2)
Why Love is not an Emotion

10. Building your Raft
125 (36)
The Five Empathic Skills

PART II Embracing your Emotions

11. Wading into the water
161 (6)
Awakening All of Your Emotions

12. ANGER: Protection and Restoration
167 (24)
Includes Rage, Fury, and the Healing of Trauma

13. APATHY AND BOREDOM: The Mask for Anger
191 (6)
14. GUILT AND SHAME: Restoring Integrity
197 (18)
15. HATRED: The Profound Mirror
215 (20)
Includes Resentment, Contempt, Disgust, and Shadow Work

16. FEAR: Intuition and Action
235 (22)
Includes Anxiety, Worry, and the Healing of Trauma

17. CONFUSION: The Mask for Fear
257 (6)
18. JEALOUSY AND ENVY: Relational Radar
263 (18)
Includes Greed

19. PANIC AND TERROR: Frozen Fire
281 (14)
Includes Healing from Trauma

20. SADNESS: Release and Rejuvenation
295 (16)
Includes Despair and Despondency

21. GRIEF: The Deep River of the Soul
311 (16)
22. DEPRESSION: Ingenious Stagnation
327 (18)
Focusing on Situational Depression

23. SUICIDAL URGES: The Darkness Before Dawn
345 (14)
24. HAPPINESS: Amusement and Anticipation
359 (6)
25. CONTENTMENT: Appreciation and Recognition
365 (4)
26. JOY: Affinity and Communion
369 (8)
Includes Exhilaration and Honoring Happiness in Others

27. STRESS AND RESISTANCE
377 (10)
Understanding Emotional Physics

28. EMOTIONS ARE YOUR NATIVE LANGUAGE
387 (6)
The Fine Art of a Life Well Lived

Acknowledgments 393 (2)
Notes 395 (4)
Further Resources 399 (6)
Index 405 (10)
About The Author 415

[Skylar Kim · Rating 5 out of 5]

My eq = infinity
My brain = huge
My depression = crippling

Bit monotonous and repetitive at times but understandably necessary for reinforcement.

Was great for learning the verbiage of the emotional world

Feels like a good book for anyone starting therapy!

[Marian Hartman · Rating 5 out of 5]

The writing efficacy of this book would bring this rating down to a 4, but when I consider the powerful impact it had and continues to have on my life, I let go of my writing snobbery and credit McLaren for helping me shift my life in such a wonderful way.

Now that I see the metaphor of our emotions simply being flow, such as a river, and not to fight the sad or the angry or what we perceive as negative emotion; I now recognize it, acknowledge it, appreciate it, and work with it. Just like we do not have to try and hold on to the perceived positive emotions in a way that induces anxiety if we dare lose it, we also don't have to pretend that what we perceived as negative emotions actually never happened.

This has helped me realise the value of simply recognizing what I am experiencing. Yes, there are ways to address every emotion, but first you have to simply sit in it and see it. This way of healthy connection to self has completely changed my ability to engage the world as fully me.

After all, emotions are simply reflections of what we are feeling. Ignoring them only creates a stress that becomes chronic and the root of our experience gets lost. This makes it so much harder to constructively engage with others as well; as our own triggers fire off and we don't know why. So we displace it onto them, and continue trying to navigate life through coping and distraction.

I highly recommend reading this book for anybody who wants to go on a journey of increasing their self-awareness of their emotions as they are experiencing them; seeing emotions as a friendly memo letting us know what's going on.

The worldview of this book is well encapsulated by Rumi:

This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they are a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice.
meet them at the door laughing and invite them in.
Be grateful for whatever comes.
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.

[Jung · Rating 5 out of 5]

Emotions are often seen as obstacles or overwhelming forces that disrupt our lives, but Karla McLaren’s "The Language of Emotions: What Your Feelings Are Trying to Tell You" offers a refreshing perspective. Rather than viewing emotions as disruptive or negative, the book presents them as vital messengers delivering important insights about our needs, boundaries, and values. McLaren invites readers to shift their mindset from resisting emotions to embracing them as a key to deeper self-awareness, authentic relationships, and a fulfilling life.

McLaren emphasizes that emotions are not merely fleeting feelings but a sophisticated internal navigation system. They constantly gather information about our environment, relationships, and inner needs, working in tandem with our rational mind to guide our decisions and interactions. For example, joy highlights what truly matters to us, anxiety signals the need to examine boundaries in a relationship, and anger alerts us to violations or injustices. Even emotions that are traditionally viewed as negative, such as sadness, shame, or fear, serve essential purposes by helping us process change, align with our values, and protect what we hold dear. Suppressing these emotions or labeling them as bad not only denies their messages but can also lead to unconscious consequences for our health and relationships.

To illustrate the power of emotional awareness, McLaren shares relatable examples. Aisha, for instance, noticed her heart racing when her partner dismissed her concerns. By listening to her body’s signals, she initiated an honest conversation that ultimately strengthened their bond. Similarly, Marcus felt unexpected anger during a family celebration and, upon reflection, uncovered unresolved feelings about his family dynamics. These examples highlight how emotions can reveal deeper truths and pave the way for healing and growth.

Understanding emotions begins with the body, as each feeling manifests through distinct physical sensations. Anger might create a heat in the chest, anxiety could feel like butterflies in the stomach, and sadness might bring a heaviness in the shoulders. McLaren recommends tuning into these physical signals to identify emotions early and prevent them from becoming overwhelming. Grounding techniques, such as deep breathing, body scans, or creating a calm environment, can help individuals connect with their emotions more effectively. Naming emotions precisely—rather than using vague terms like “feeling bad”—also enhances understanding. Recognizing that multiple emotions can coexist, such as joy and grief or fear and excitement, further deepens emotional awareness.

Practical steps, such as moving the body through walking or stretching, practicing self-compassion, and establishing calming rituals, support emotional resilience. McLaren shares examples of individuals who have used these techniques successfully. Sofia, for instance, dealt with anxiety about a family conflict by starting her mornings with quiet reflection and naming her feelings. This practice allowed her to recognize when her worry was escalating and take necessary breaks. Similarly, Asher processed the complex emotions of relief and grief after ending a long-term relationship by focusing on his physical sensations and acknowledging his feelings without judgment. These stories underscore the transformative power of self-awareness and self-care.

Difficult emotions, such as anger, shame, and fear, often feel overwhelming, but McLaren encourages readers to approach them with curiosity rather than judgment. These emotions carry crucial messages: anger signals violations of boundaries, fear highlights areas needing protection, and shame points to challenges in aligning with core values. By pausing and creating space to explore these emotions, individuals can respond thoughtfully rather than react impulsively. McLaren also acknowledges the layers of emotions that may amplify each other, such as sadness triggering fears of abandonment or disappointment stirring feelings of shame. Recognizing and untangling these layers takes time and patience, but it ultimately leads to greater self-understanding.

Reframing intense emotions into valuable insights is a skill that develops with practice. For example, Helena managed jealousy by exploring its underlying message: a need for quality connection and clear communication with her partner. David, on the other hand, transformed persistent shame about a past mistake into personal growth by practicing self-compassion and recognizing that mistakes are part of the human experience. These stories illustrate that even the most challenging emotions can become opportunities for growth when approached with openness and kindness.

Building emotional intelligence requires regular practice and a supportive environment. McLaren suggests establishing daily emotional check-ins to notice feelings and physical sensations before the demands of the day take over. Creating designated spaces for reflection and taking short breaks during busy days can also prevent emotional buildup. Over time, individuals can identify their emotional triggers and patterns, which enables proactive responses to challenging situations. For instance, Amara incorporated brief grounding exercises into her workday, which helped her navigate stressful interactions with clarity and presence. Jason, recognizing the need for additional support, sought counseling to better understand his emotional patterns and manage anxiety.

Developing emotional intelligence also involves building a community of supportive individuals who encourage emotional growth. Sharing experiences with trusted friends, family, or groups focused on emotional wellness can make the journey feel less isolating. Progress in emotional awareness is gradual and non-linear, with each experience contributing to growth. Celebrating small victories, such as recognizing an emotion early or responding thoughtfully to a trigger, reinforces the development of emotional skills.

Each emotion carries a distinct message that can provide valuable insights into our needs and values. For example, anger often signals a violation of boundaries, while fear highlights areas requiring protection. Sadness helps process change and loss, while joy and excitement illuminate fulfilling paths forward. McLaren emphasizes the importance of deepening one’s emotional vocabulary to better understand these messages. Journaling can be a powerful tool for this purpose, as it allows individuals to explore their feelings without judgment and recognize patterns over time.

Ultimately, "The Language of Emotions" serves as a guide to transforming emotions from perceived enemies into trusted allies. By tuning into the body’s signals, creating space for all emotions, and practicing emotional awareness, individuals can decode the unique languages of their feelings and gain deeper self-understanding. With regular practice, supportive routines, and compassionate community, even the most challenging emotions can become valuable guides. This shift from resistance to emotional intelligence paves the way for authentic relationships, clear boundaries, and a fulfilling life.

[Greg Jemsek · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's not an easy matter to write skillfully, pragmatically, and heartfelt all at once about a subject such as emotions. Karla McClaren does so with this book. The pragmatic methods for grounding and boundary setting are not novel, but her descriptions of them are because she understands people have various abilities to visualize, and the space she creates around this allows each person using this to somewhat personalize the exercise w/o losing its essence. Her detail in describing how different emotions interact and impact a person is extremely helpful in setting a standard where emotions are welcomed into a person's life, and difficult moments are consistently identified as something a person has to "go through" rather than transcend or push to the side in other ways. Her skill in this makes her descriptions useful to coaches, workshop leaders, therapists and educators alike. It's a wonderfully useful book.

[Natalía Papadopoúlou · Rating 3 out of 5]

Have mixed feelings about this book. On one hand I really enjoy the part of the book where references are made to older/other cultures on how they perceive feelings as the basic elements (water, air, fire, earth) as I benefit from thinking in metaphors. Also the part about distractions and addictions is probably true and aligned with many other books. On the other hand I would really have to mention I can imagine the book being at least half in size with some proper editting, it got me skipping and skimming through most of the final part where each emotion is analyzed. I would say it offers an out of the box approach, so only read it if you are not looking about scientific stuff for a change.