Bart Anderson would challenge his students: "All of your feelings eventually do come out to play. You can either address them willingly- or on your hands and knees.”

People stress taking responsibility for all kinds of things these days. But what about being responsible for what you are feeling? The overall healthiest thing you can do with a feeling is to express it.

Feelings are energy. They work best when we experience (feel) and release (express) them. So it would follow that emotional responsibility is committing to whenever you experience a significant feeling, you find someone to express it to.

Think of it as being responsible to yourself.

It needn't always be the same person. One person may better accept one feeling and another person may more readily accept another. Discernment is essential when identifying someone to share your feeling with.

Their ability to accept the feeling you need to express is the most essential quality in choosing someone to express your feeling to. Someone that has a similar life experience may be able to understand and relate to the feeling.

Obviously some feelings are best expressed to the person you are feeling them toward. Relational feelings such as anger and love work best when they are expressed directly to the person you feel them toward.

Journaling is also an excellent tool to express your feelings. Often feelings and their corresponding thoughts will cycle around and around your psyche until you place them outside of yourself.

Writing allows you to concretize your feelings outside of yourself so you can relate to them. Just like sometimes you need to hear yourself saying something to someone in order to understand it.

And don't think about it too much. Note that you are feeling something, identify someone to share it with, and start expressing. You might feel a little vulnerable afterward. That means you are doing it right.

Photo by Lilibeth Bustos Linares on Unsplash