Quotes from Leslie S. Greenberg

Emotions are seen as crucial in motivating behavior. People generally do what they feel like doing rather than what reason or logic dictates. It follows that to achieve behavioral change, people need to change the emotions motivating their behavior. Emotion also influences thought. When people feel angry, they think angry thoughts; when they are sad, they recall sad memories. To help people change what they think, therapists must help them change what they feel.

Rather than being guided by images of how to be, people need to attend to how they actually are and to respect this.

Emotional expression governs, and changes, interaction. Anger, for example, produces distance, whereas vulnerability disarms. Thus, interpersonal conflict can be resolved by changing what people express

Emotional approach and awareness should be used when the emotions are below some manageable level of arousal, say 70%, but distraction and regulation should be applied when they exceed this level and the emotions become unmanageable. In