Quotes About Emotions

In the limousine on the way to my father's graveside services, I started to cry. My mother slapped me and told me to stop crying. I lacked a model to show me how to feel compassion for my pain.

I never learned how to process my own pain.

It's okay to be angry. Your mother should not have allowed this to happen....

Trying to forgive all these years, I had suppressed my anger and memories because I couldn't forgive if I acknowledged my experiences

For forgiveness does not resolve latent hatred and self-hatred but rather covers them up in a very dangerous way.

My forgiveness had not solved my latent hatred or self-hatred.

Well," he said with a sigh, "psychology for years used to counsel to forgive. But we are beginning to recognize that it isn't always possible or even healthy to do that. I believe that sometimes it is important not to forgive, and to hang onto a healthy sort of rage at what happened,

To the little girl it wasn't funny. She felt wistful and a bit sad that it had taken so long to be free of being responsible for the happiness of others, free of guilt, and free not to forgive—and free to choose not to even see her mother.

Grandpa pleaded with Grandma, "Stop it Opal! Stop it. Nancy was a wonderful child." Grandma ignored his pleas and said as she left the room, "I'm disgusted with you, and I suppose this is the end of our friendship.

It is my experience that you must heal in order to forgive.

One of the most dangerous things about forgiveness is that it undercuts your ability to let go of your pent-up emotions.

Memories flooded back for me as I mourned increasing losses.

To forgive without expressing anger or disappointment is to forgive from a position of weakness. •?Forgiving from weakness only invites more hurt. It never quite catches up with the pain.

How devastating to be hated by one's own mother.

I always related to the pain of others; I had become numb and unaware of my own.

When we have been betrayed in our most basic human relationship—and that trust is never restored—how can we learn to trust ourselves to respond appropriately to betrayal?

Nurturing family relationships were outside my realm of experience.

Imprisoned by silence, my emotions turned to slush.

My brothers did not have the courage to risk losing Mom's love, by facing the damage her betrayal had done to us. I was already aware that I did not have my mother's unconditional love.

Feeling my anger and sadness were beyond my comprehension. These were skills I didn't learn as a child and didn't even know I lacked.

In childhood as well as adulthood, each time I shared my feelings with someone, the chosen confidant denied my perceptions

I never really knew her," I said. "But you loved her," Ida answered, and again I wasn't sure if she meant that as an accusation or comfort. Was it less important or more important to know someone than to love them?

In a rare moment of self-awareness, the young woman even understood that her dependence was probably unhealthy. Henry, she declared, was a man 'whom I love too much for my peace.

Contradictory emotions roiled over her; grief over Arnold's thwarted plans and their mutual hopes for a large reward; relief that her husband was safe, coupled with doubts abut their marriage. Would she ever see Arnold again?