The way we are often asked to deal with emotions is to simply ignore them. When things turn ugly, how many times have we heard “just grin and bear it”, or “this too shall pass”, or “time is the best healer”.
These statements are each true no doubt, but in that very moment, does “not dealing” with the emotions we are going through help us?
Likely not. In her book, Brene lists 87 types of emotions. Wow. That number blew my mind. Eight seven of them, really?
Apparently there are more, but she just chose those she felt were most important, and what we tend to experience fairly regularly.
She also didn’t want her book to be translated into any other languages because she would have no control over the final meaning. For instance, the word shame in English has at least 3 similar but different words in Spanish.
Why is it important to name these emotions properly? More tomorrow…