CHAPTER 1
We Have Feelings Because…?
MANY OF US ARE HANDICAPPED without knowing it. We enter the race to go the distance only to realize that we’ve left one of our legs at the starting line. We wonder why we never finish, why the race seems so much harder than we expected or had hoped for.
We have survived as a species and travel through life because we have various ways of knowing, an advantage that has enabled us to outlive, overcome and, at times, abuse other forms of life. We gather information with our thinking mind, our body intuition, our creative intuition, and our emotional repertoire. To ignore any of these, particularly the mind or the emotions, is to run the race with one leg at best.
The intent of this book is to inspire and teach you how to become an expert about yourself, primarily your emotional system. Nothing less than that. In later chapters, I will be more specific as to how feelings work, what they do for us and what to do with them since this is a “hands-on” book. For now, I would focus on the barriers: the fears, the shame and, at times, the disdain many of us associate with a “show of feelings” and being “ruled by emotions.” Despite the growing pool of information about the damage we suffer by neglecting our emotions, most people would rather ignore, deny, or surgically remove the pesky and painful things.
Courage is not a quality typically associated with emotions. Men, in particular, seem to be genetically and culturally damned when it comes to these “touchy feely” things that get in the way of getting a job done, relaxing on a fishing boat or tennis court, or hanging out with a spouse without having to talk or relate. One of the greatest stigmas men face is that it is soft, weak, and unmanly to feel, much less to show emotions. This attitude is deeply embedded in corporate and business cultures, precisely the places where men have to prove their worth on a daily basis.
Underneath the strutting and the peacocking, men are often afraid to feel. Unquestioned shame and perceived inadequacy drive them down endless corridors of work and career. Ignored sadness sets them up for callousness and depression. The fear of intimacy, of relational closeness beyond orgasm, leads to a loneliness and disconnection that are often buried in busyness and other addictions.
Brendan is an old friend, a prince among men, many would say. He’s your classic nice guy. So nic
