I think of feelings as information that help me act in my own best interest. They work with my intellect to give me a clearer picture of what I am thinking about myself, others, my world around me. But then, I love my defenses too; my personal super hero powers that keep me safe :-)

I don't think feelings are attached to just external things; we feel about ourselves too, based on our own actions. When we think we did something "stupid" for example, we don't feel too good about ourselves? Unless we use our intellect to examine the "stupid" and check it out, figure out exactly what it means, how it compares to our other behavior, whether other people we know do similar things, etc. If we don't pair our feelings with our intellect/reasoning, we can end up stewing in our own negative feelings which, if accepted, unchallenged, cause negative thoughts to arise which cause more negative feelings, etc.

I was with a college dorm neighbor "friend" and we went to the local college-town grocery store, were walking around, it was a week day and there weren't many people in the store. She picked up a Tastykake or something, unwrapped it, and starting eating it.

I felt afraid.

That's direct and easy enough; I was with her, afraid she/we would get caught and punished; afraid because I had never seen or done anything like that and did not have "control" over the situation; I'm basically honest and it's stealing so I saw this "friend" as not just a thief but an I-don't-care-about-these-people person and if she did not respect them, where was the line between she and I? Would she steal from me if she wanted something of mine?

I asked her, "Are you going to pay for that?" She said, "Yes." I relaxed a little bit. The situation became less chaotic and more understandable; I thought she was hungry, would get the couple other items she wanted, present them and the cake wrapper to the checkout clerk and all would be well.

She casually put down the cake wrapper on a shelf in another aisle. Okay, my brain thought quickly, she'll tell the clerk what it was and the clerk will add it to her bill that way.

We went through the checkout aisle, no mention was made of the cake. We exited the store.

I felt afraid.

Did you notice I did not really "do" anything in the above story, the story is really about someone else? I just felt and thought? Yes, my feeling and thinking did get me to ask if she was going to pay. . . and that helped me momentarily lower my level of anxiety (did not have anything to do with her).

What happens if I tell myself, "You should have stopped her!"?
What happens if I tell myself, "I'm glad that is finally over with."?
What happens if I tell myself, "You should go back in the store and tell the manager."?
What happens if I tell myself, "Hey, I should try that!"?
What happens if I tell myself, "Go back in there and give the clerk the money, tell her "we" were hungry, ate the cake and forgot to pay for it."?

Remember, I told you when we got outside, I was afraid (different fear now from when I saw her take the cake and eat it); how does that color the answer to the above? Which of the above is "most likely"?

That's what we do every day with our emotions, but in split second time and without as much analysis, often, not enough. One of my stepmother's favorite sayings was, "The truth if it kills you!" and she was serious about that My thoughts, feelings and behavior growing up were trained by that woman. The idea of "Hey, I should try that" did not enter my thoughts that day :-)

So, we go to therapy to look at a few of our "bigger" memories and explore what we were thinking and feeling and where it came from and what we might have been thinking and feeling but it came/went so fast we were unaware. Was I perhaps jealous that my friend got away with it and I never seemed to? How about anger at my friend for putting me in that position, especially with no warning? And me, Miss Goodie Two-shoes, why did I accept the word of a thief instead of calling her on her thievery right then and there? Because it was "easier" for me? Why didn't I at least walk away from the train wreck I suspected was going down? I felt really strongly (obviously, here I am talking about it and recalling it 40+ years later?) about a 79¢ item, was it really THAT big of a deal?