Your Feelings Are Here For A Reason
Written by Lauren Helm, Ph.D.
There are multiple theories about what emotions are, and why we have them. Whether or not we have full certainty regarding the nature and purpose of human emotion, they without a doubt continuously color our daily lives, creating a rich tapestry of felt experience. Sometimes dully present in the background, and at other times potently grabbing our attention, without them, there is no doubt that the human experience would be dramatically different. Without them, human beings may not exist.
The Purpose of Emotions: An Evolutionary Perspective
It can be helpful to think of emotions as signals that alert us (and others) to what we might need in that moment. Emotions are much more complex than just that, of course (for example, psychologists commonly understand emotions as cognitive, affective, and physiological changes, as well as behavioral urges). However, it is thought by evolutionary psychologists that emotions serve an important function or purpose that has helped keep human beings alive: they help organize and motivate behavior based on the demands of the environment or situation. Emotions act as signals because they direct our attention to important information about the state of our inner and outer environment, and automatically create an impulse to respond in a way that is intended to ensure our basic survival needs are met.
The Purpose of Pleasure & Pain
How exactly do emotions guide us? To better understand this, it helps to think about how both pleasure and pain influence us. Pleasure and pain are fundamental and essential aspects of being alive. Generally speaking, pleasure and pain can be both physical and emotional. Physical and emotional pain actually overlap quite a bit because of the way the brain works.
Usually, pleasure and pain urge us to respond in particular ways when we feel them. Let’s say you touch a hot stove, and feel the searing pain of the hot stove on your fingertip. The physical pain will almost certainly prompt you to immediately remove your finger from the stovetop as quickly as possible to stop or reduce the pain. Generally, when something is painful, we are powerfully driven to stop or get rid of the pain by escaping whatever might be causing it. Usually physical pain is caused by physical damage or danger to the integrity of the organism. As you and I well know, physical pain is a powerful motivator for immediately avoiding or escaping danger. Without physical pain, we may continue to expose ourselves to harmful or life-threatening situations.
Conversely, physical pleasure guides us to pursue more of whatever is the source of our pleasure. We are naturally reinforced for engaging in certain behaviors that feel physically pleasurable, and that often meet important base-level survival needs. For example, we are drawn to foods that are filled with energy-dense sugars and fats, sex that leads to procreation, and temperate and comfortable environments that are gentle on our bodies and abundant in necessary resources.
Avoidance and Approach Behaviors
In many ways, emotional pleasure and pain can be thought of as serving a similar evolutionary function to physical pleasure and pain. Similar to physical pain or pleasure, pleasant and unpleasant emotions often urge us to engage in variations of “avoidance” or “approach” behaviors that guide us towards safety and away from possible harm.
In other words, “negative” or unpleasant emotions tend to naturally urge us to avoid or escape whatever might be causing them; if we feel emotionally uncomfortable, we want to get rid of that discomfort or avoid experiencing it again in the future, and we take actions to do so. From an evolutionary perspective, this makes sense, because if “bad” feelings come up in us when something potentially dangerous or harmful happens, we will naturally be motivated to get away from that harmful stimulus.
For our primal ancestors, events that caused them to feel emotionally “bad” or distressed typically could or would quite literally hurt or kill them if not avoided or escaped. Imagine how it would feel to have to contend with lions, tigers, snakes, bears, wolves, or other frightening predators. Likely, you would feel a mixture of very unpleasant and intense emotions, such as panic or fear, or maybe even anger, that would pretty immediately urge you to run away and escape, or to aggressively fight back. You likely would not have to think twice about it – you would automatically and immediately engage in these avoid and escape survival behaviors. And thank goodness for emotional and behavioral responses such as these.
On the flip side, “positive” or pleasant emotions tend to naturally urge us to approach, or move towards, the situations that we experience pleasurable feelings from. Human beings are often very strongly motivated to feel “good” or “happy.” Positive emotions powerfully urge us to engage in certain behaviors, and they also reinforce whatever actions we engage in that lead us to feel emotional pleasure. Typically, positive emotions tend to lead us to engage in “approach” type behaviors, which means that we approach, or seek more of, the stimulus or situation that caused us to feel positively. If something makes us feel good (or great!) we tend to try to do things that will increase the amount of pleasure or good feelings we are having in that moment, or that will recreate the experience again in the future. This also makes sense from an evolutionary perspective, as things that give us pleasure or feel good often may signal to us that our basic needs may be met. For example, the experience of falling in love is usually an intense emotion that feels incredible and ecstatic, and leads us trying to secure the time and attention of the person who is the focus of our affection. We are social animals, and positive emotions that come from relationship help motivate us to stay connected. This has a survival advantage, because when we are on our own (especially thousands of years ago), human beings don’t stand as good of a chance of surviving potential threats.
Emotions in today’s world
It’s quite clear that the world that we live in today is radically different from that of our primal ancestors’. Our modern-day dangers, like the loss of a job or home, being bullied, excessive demands from school or work, car accidents, arguments with friends, or family discord, require us to respond differently than we would to a predator. However, when we encounter these modern-day stressors, our automatic physiological and emotional responses often occur in a similar fashion to how they would if we encountered primal threats to our survival - as if our lives are in danger. The “fight, flight, or freeze” response, which was is an emotionally-driven response intended to protect us from death, can be activated even when we have a disagreement with a friend. Thus, in today’s world, it is quite often the case that our instinctual emotional responses do not fully align with the more actual needs of the modern-day situations we encounter, which are typically much more nuanced (and less likely to be characterized by true danger of death). Every human being has experienced emotions that do not match the needs of the situation. There is nothing wrong with you (or me) when this occurs - looking at it through an evolutionary lens, it is actually quite natural.
However, despite the natural tendency to experience emotions that may be arise in us more intensely than would necessarily be helpful, it is still our responsibility to learn how to respond to situations (and our emotions) in ways that are healthy and effective - so that we can truly understand and take care of our needs, and build a life that feels satisfying and meaningful. This is no easy task. When emotions burn intensely, and we don’t understand why they are here or what to do with them (or we over-identify with and “become” them), we often engage in reactive, avoidant, or self-destructive behaviors. It makes sense to act on emotionally-driven avoidance urges when they are signaling true danger of death or harm (for example, the panic or fear that causes strong urges to escape, and helps us to immediately jump out of the way of an oncoming car!), but to automatically react to or avoid all painful or uncomfortable emotions will spell trouble. Numbing ourselves with TV, alcohol, food, or dissociation often lead to short-term relief, but more pain and suffering in the long-term. Withdrawing from or escaping the world or those in our lives leads to short-term relief, but more pain and suffering in the long-term. Lashing out or reacting impulsively in response to anger or fear leads to short-term relief, but more pain and suffering in the long-term. You get the point. These automatic, avoidant ways of responding to emotions are be hard to free ourselves from, given our instinctual drive to avoid pain and feel “better” (or at least, not so “bad). But when we take pause, and if we are honest with ourselves, we know our needs are not truly met when we act in these ways - in fact, we often have unintentionally acted in ways that prevent our needs from being met, and further entrench us in our suffering.
What is Needed
We have to learn how to turn towards, understand, tolerate, and eventually accept emotional discomfort in order to intentionally and effectively respond to our needs. Even if our emotions do not seem to fully match the requirements of the situation, I believe that there is almost always something of value that they are pointing our attention towards. We yearn to feel safe, secure, cared for and loved. We yearn to feel valued and worthy. We yearn to know that we belong, and an integral part of something bigger than ourselves. These are often the needs that our emotions are pointing us towards. When these needs are not truly being met (whether that be due to an internal or external cause, or both), we will feel emotional discomfort. And thank goodness for that. Because it is signaling our attention to what matters most to us. When we can learn how to truly attend to our needs, and understand how to work with the signals that come from within, we are in a position of empowerment. We can consciously respond to our lives. This is the practice of a lifetime.
How can we do this? How can we begin to emotions in a more self-supportive way? The first step is to understand that our emotions are here for a reason. They are not our enemies. They serve an important purpose, but understanding how to sit with, and listen to them, is key. If we are fearful of our emotions, or do everything we can to remove or distance ourselves from our uncomfortable emotions, it is incredibly difficult to learn from our life experiences, or to deepen our understanding of what is truly needed in our most vulnerable, painful moments. We miss an opportunity to learn about ourselves. But when we are no longer afraid of what comes from within - when we can begin to better understand and make peace with our emotional “signals” - we can learn how to attend to the needs that our emotions are truly a reflection of. It is our responsibility to ourselves, and to others, to learn how to soothe and care for ourselves in the ways that matter most. Remember, we all want to feel safe, loved, and at peace. Ask yourself, what will truly bring more of what you deeply need into your life? How can you offer yourself a safe, loving presence, while you feel scared, hurt, sad, alone, or angry? What will care for the needs of your body, mind, and heart, in ways that are tender and self-loving? In ways that do not cause you additional harm, or cause you to feel “stuck” in suffering? It is okay if the answers to these questions do not come easily to you. You are not alone in that. These are skills that we need to learn - and that many of us were never taught - these are the emotion regulation and inner-parenting skills that require guidance, repetition and tremendous patience, as there will be many missteps and falling back into old, pain-avoidant or reactive ways. But the path of making peace with our emotions, better navigating our inner world, and ultimately making peace with ourselves, is so very, very worthwhile. When we have learned how to truly care for ourselves, others, and our planet, perhaps then, we have entered into the next stage of evolution in our experience of human emotion.