Emotions aren't the issue - unhealed wounds are
How I use Internal Family Systems when people are struggling with emotions and desires
I shared a post on Facebook from Pete Enns / The Bible for Normal People about emotions that generated some discussion.
I’m typing out the content of their text images below, and you can see their original post here.
“Does the Bible say our hearts are wicked and we can’t trust ourselves? Jeremiah 17:9 has been used as a clobber passage to tell people not to trust themselves or listen to their hearts. But Jeremiah 17:9 wasn’t written to us or about us. The book of Jeremiah is about Judah’s disobedience. That’s all Jeremiah cares about. Jeremiah 17:9 says, “The heart is devious above all else - who can understand it?” It doesn’t say, “Who can possibly do any good?” or “Never trust yourself!” Jeremiah 17:9 was written at a specific moment in time when Babylonians were coming to invade. Jeremiah used hyperbolic language to expose Judah’s disobedience to God. It’s also worth noting that vs 7-8, Jeremiah says people who trust God are blessed. So it’s clear that at least some people’s hearts trusted in God and were not deceitful above all else. To say this verse is suggesting that we can’t trust ourselves or that the heart is evil at all times and all places undervalues and misrepresents the text.”
This is SO IMPORTANT. I get questions about this verse all the time when I tell people their emotions matter. It is right and good to pay attention to your emotions - this verse does not mean to distrust your emotions.
A common question I get from pastors and well-meaning Christians around this verse is, “What do we do when people say they want to ‘follow their heart’ but what they want to do is contradictory to how I interpret the Bible? Doesn’t this verse mean they should be suspicious of what their heart is telling them to do?”
That question is why I spent a big chunk of a chapter of my master’s thesis disambiguating “feeling,” “desire,” and “emotion.” They are different things.
Briefly:
A feeling is a physical sensation. It is one of the building blocks of emotion but is not the same thing as an emotion.
A desire is simply wanting something with intensity. We can have sinful desires when Sin acts on us, but desire is not inherently bad.
An emotion is the meaning our minds make from our bodies’ sensations, dependent on the cultural and linguistic inputs that have shaped our emotions throughout our lives.
So once we realize that we shouldn’t conflate desire and emotion, we can better answer the questions, “How do we help ourselves and others discern the difference between emotions and potentially sinful desires? How do we make faithful decisions to follow Jesus when we feel tumultuous/ conflicting/ confusing emotions and when we want things that might be harmful for us?”
I find Internal Family Systems to be a helpful model for this process. It gets to the core of why we feel and react the way we do and helps us find the wounds underneath that long to be healed and the needs that want to get met. Then we can address those wounds and needs more productively.
I made up the following sample of how an IFS conversation might go. A piece of work like this can easily take an hour, so I have truncated and simplified it.
I have been a client of an IFS therapist for four years, and it has radically improved my life and healed my symptoms of C-PTSD. I am a trained IFS practitioner, and I offer emotion coaching using this model.
photo by Nik Shuliahin on Unsplash
Bob wants a new pair of expensive sneakers that he saw his preacher wearing. He desires to have them but can't afford them. He thinks it will make him happy to have them so he justifies stealing them.
Some people would say this is an emotion problem - he thinks the sneakers would make him happy, so therefore his seeking happiness is the problem, so therefore he should control his emotions and not listen to them.
Scripturally speaking, coveting and stealing are sinful, so that is where he went wrong - he gave in to sinful desires.
But I would ask Bob something like the following.
Me: Where do you feel that burning desire to have the sneakers in your body or around your body?
Bob: In my chest. It's like a tightness.
Me: Can you see if that part of you would let go of your body so you can hear it better?
Bob: Yeah, it's stepping back.
Me: How do you feel toward that part that wants the sneakers?
Bob: I'm curious why it wants that so badly.
Me: Great. Can you ask this part what it does in your life to protect you?
Bob: It keeps me from getting bullied.
Me: What is it afraid will happen if you are bullied?
Bob: I would feel small and insignificant. I would lose my friends.
Me: Does that make sense to you?
Bob: Yeah, it does. I'm remembering a time when I was 12 that some kids I thought were my friends made fun of me because my jeans weren't cool and they were too short.
Me: Can you ask the part that keeps you from getting bullied if it is protecting that 12-year-old boy?
Bob: Yes, it is.
Me: Would that part be willing to let you go talk to the 12-year-old boy? We can help him feel better and not carry that pain anymore, then this part that is protecting him wouldn’t have to work so hard.
Bob: Yeah, he is willing to let us do that.
Me: That’s wonderful. Let's go talk to the boy. Where do you find him?
Bob: He is in his room crying.
Me: Can you go over to him and comfort him? Is he receptive to that?
Bob: Yes, he is letting me sit next to him on the bed.
Me: What does he want you to know about his life and experiences?
Bob: His parents couldn’t afford new clothes more than once a year, but he is growing really fast. He’s too young to get a job, and he doesn't know what to do. He is afraid the other kids are going to keep making fun of him. He just wants to be like them
Me: That’s really hard. How do you want to respond to him?
Bob: I’m telling him he didn’t deserve to be treated badly. He feels better hearing that.
Me: What do you want him to know about your life now?
Bob: I’m telling him about how I learned to buy secondhand clothes in college and developed my own sense of style.
Me: What does he think about that?
Bob: He thinks it’s pretty cool. He’s smiling.
Me: What does he need from you now that he needed but didn’t get at the time?
Bob: He needed someone to tell him that his worth wasn’t in his clothes. He is a good kid. He’s really creative and kind.
Me: How does he respond to that?
Bob: He is crying. He likes to hear that.
Me: How would he like to let go of any painful beliefs or thoughts he took on during that time?
Bob: He would like to burn them in a campfire.
Me: Okay! Can you help him do that? .... After he is done, what qualities would he like to invite in their place?
Bob: He would like confidence and playfulness.
Me: Wonderful. He doesn't have to stay in this painful memory. Where would he like to go to be safe, in the present or an imaginary place?
Bob: He would like to go to the craft store and spend his allowance on art supplies instead of on trendy jeans he doesn’t even like!
Me: Let him do that then. ... Would the part that protects you from bullying like to come back and see how this boy is doing now?
Bob: Yeah, he is really amazed! He can’t believe the difference.
Me: If that part could let go of having to protect this boy, since he is okay now, what would it like to do in your life instead?
Bob: It would like to help me be confident in my creativity. I would love that.
Me: What a great job for this part to do! Bob, let’s check back in with what you told me at the beginning. You were wanting to steal those sneakers because this part of you thought it would make you happy. What really makes you happy in life?
Bob: Getting to do my artwork. I haven’t touched it in so long because I've been working so much.
Me: Is there a time this week you could get out your art supplies?
Bob: Sure! I could do it Wednesday night when I get off work early.
(If the client is a Christian and is open to it, we can also invite Jesus into the conversation with the parts.)
Me: Bob, would any of these parts like to talk with Jesus?
Bob: Yes, the part that wants to help me be creative does.
Me: What does Jesus want to say to this part of you?
Bob: Jesus is saying, he doesn’t have to have what other people have to be happy. Jesus made me just as I am for a reason, and he really likes me.
Me: That’s beautiful, Bob.
photo by Nik Shuliahin on Unsplash
Bob wasn’t really having a problem with emotions. His search for happiness was coming from a really understandable part of himself that was trying to protect him from feeling the same pain he felt as a bullied child. That part’s method (covet and steal shoes) wasn’t actually helpful, but its intention was good. Once Bob could find and heal that wounded part of himself, he was free to make better choices to pursue happiness.
So often when people think they have an emotion problem, they actually have an unmet need or an unhealed wound. How can you compassionately care for them (or yourself) instead of shaming those very normal human emotions and trying to shut them down?
If you would like support in processing your emotions, I have space for 2-3 more clients in my fall schedule. Contact me via my website.
The "parts" is such an interesting aspect of the makeup of the human being. The ability for soliloquy (Psalm 103, for instance) and its effectiveness as a means of transformation is profoundly under-utilized. Thank you for the post!