Owning your feelings takes commitment and humility. Owning your own feelings is critical to making your marriage a good one. This can be difficult but when done correctly it is actually very liberating. Frequently we can feel that someone else is responsible for how we feel. This belief leads to a loss of personal control and power and leads us to further believing that we are not responsible for our own behaviours. This belief results in a loss of love that would otherwise potentially come your way.

Taking responsibility

For any effective mental health and therapeutic work to succeed taking personal responsibility is necessary but not necessarily very comfortable. Taking responsibility for our feelings, attitudes, and behaviours is key to our spiritual and mental health. Just to be clear, there is no forward motion, no true results, no real healing that comes into our lives without taking personal responsibility.

I wish to further qualify this by saying that there are many individuals who over-blame themselves for everything while others choose to blame everybody else for everything and then again there is a minority that choose to “own their stuff” by taking responsibility for those things that they are personally responsible for. I know this seems like tough medicine, and it sure is, but this is the pathway to personal power and freedom and the possible eventuality of having a good marriage.

Responsibility is ownership

To take responsibility is to be mature, humble and a person who desires truth. To take personal responsibility is to be willing to see your behaviour and attitudes and recognize that they are yours and nobody else’s. It’s my responsibility how I act. The comedian, the late Flip Wilson, popularized the saying, “The devil made me do it!” In that joke we can find what is called a psychological projection, this is where someone else is to blame for ones impulses or qualities that are undesirable or harmful.

Ask yourself, who is it that is experiencing the feeling? I am! Am I responsible for what I am feeling or not? If not, then it wouldn’t matter how I act out then, would it? That is what we would like to believe. When we feel emotionally injured we need to take responsibility for it immediately. Now, I am not inferring that you shouldn’t be feeling the pain or that the reason you are feeling the pain is your fault rather I am saying, what you do with what you are feeling is where personal responsibility comes into play. Think about it this way, I am feeling the feelings the other person is not making me feel though they could be perpetrating it. Sometimes the line of responsibility can seem blurred especially when we are in great emotional pain, but if we can more objectively ask ourselves some questions and observe we can probably come to some better conclusions.

Victim or Victor?

To some degree we all have had a victim mentality at some point in time, while there are those of us who still carry that around in our injured soul. Staying stuck in this can have us believing such negative beliefs as, “I always get the short end of the stick.” “I am always in trouble or to blame.” “Bad things always come my way.” “I always get stuck with …” “My spouse is always hurting me.” “There is no point in trying.” “If I don’t do it nobody else will.” “I’m the one that has to carry the load around here.” These and other such statements indicate a victim mentality which keeps us stuck in a belief of powerlessness and in the emotion of self-pity.

Using self-pity or the victim mentality creates for us a sub-standard quality of life. If you are stuck in a victim mentality or self-pity don’t deny it or blame and shame yourself simply recognize it, own it and realize that you need some good qualified help. We all need help from time to time in our lives because some tasks, including our own soul, needs help from qualified others to get unstuck, healed, and move forward.

Staying stuck is a choice. We can choose freedom but you should know that this will take effort on your part. Approximately 3,300 years ago we see ancient Israel in slavery under Pharaoh where the people wanted to be free from the oppression of slavery but when they became liberated they then had to think, live and believe differently. This involved making difficult choices and doing difficult tasks and having hurdles to overcome. Even though Moses did much of the intervention with God’s help there was still a lot of struggle and a lot of work for the newly liberated nation. Having freedom takes bravery and determination working with someone qualified that can help you to finally experience the freedom that all people are supposed enjoy.

Why does my partner drive me crazy?

Marriage is the one relationship that can be the most rewarding, the most intimate of any other relationship but it is also the most emotional relationship you will ever have. If you are reading this you probably have experienced what it is like for your partner to “push the buttons”. This experience is the result of two people who usually are acting out of hurt feelings and therefore one or the other party is punishing their partner in return by their own reactional behaviour.

Sometimes you may experience your partner pushing your buttons and in turn you are being triggered emotionally, but they may not be doing it intentionally rather your negative experience is the result of some pain or painful events in the past that have not been processed by your brain as yet.

Think about a drinking glass. You and I are like that drinking glass and what is in that glass are all of our life’s experiences from the past and if filled with negative things then when current negative things happen our glass gets too full or starts to spill over resulting in feelings like you are going crazy from the emotional pain. If you don’t take ownership of this then the result will be a sense of powerlessness, a victim mentality, and self-sabotage of your most intimate relationship.

Conclusion

“Owning my own feelings” means that you refuse to be a victim anymore, you choose to get the help you need to begin your healing process and begin to communicate with your partner in a more meaningful and healing like manner resulting in a better marriage relationship which will bring you closer and closer to the loving relationship you have wanted.

Be sure to read this entire series (click on words below):

Part 1: Commitment

Part 2: Humility

Disclaimer:  This article is not meant to diagnose, treat nor is it any kind of conclusive evidence, this article is simply the opinion of the author.  This article is meant for personal reflection and inspiration only.

Sources:

Psychological Projection:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_projection

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=exodus+1&version=KJV

There are those times in life where we try to change but we are unsuccessful in doing so.  Why can I not change how I feel on my own?  The answer oversimplified is because we need other people to help us.  

Learned Feelings From Childhood

We learned our emotions from our mother on a physiological level from our mothers in utero.  Through the umbilical cord the child learns emotions through the nervous system and hormonal system.  What the mother thinks and feels and experiences is transmitted to the infant through the nervous system and through the blood flow that carries hormones from mother to the child through the attachment of the umbilical cord.  This is how we all first learned to experience emotions, through our physical connection with our mother.

Learned emotions from mom

We also learned emotions and feelings from how our mother looked at us and spoke to us.  Did our mother look into our eyes and gaze at us with emotional connection of love and adoration or was our mother distant in her mind, what she watching television, or in today’s world on the cell phone or computer instead of making that eye connection to help create a secure emotional bonding.  Through this quality of experience we begin to either feel emotionally safe or emotionally unsafe. 

Learned emotions from your home environment

We learn emotions from our home dynamics how people spoke to each other and acted towards each other.  Was the home environment physically affectionate and loving?  Was the home environment full of conflict and possibly violent?  Was our home ambivalent and emotionally detached and indifferent?  We can have a mixture of these types of environments also.  The environment we grew up in is how we learned to feel and how we learned to emotionally regulate and attach to other people around us.

Emotional connection, emotional upheavals, emotional issues all stem from childhood because of the emotional skills our parents handed down to us through their emotions intelligence.  Blaming is not the answer anymore than denial is but recognizing and understanding where things came from and then pursuing healthy emotional changes takes courage and commitment.  With therapies like EMDR, Homeopathy and others we can overcome our insufficiencies and weakness and gain the emotional balance we need.  Call today! 

>> EMDR Therapy

>> Homeopathy 

At New Hope Counselling Centre we can help you to obtain a better tomorrow.  Call us today!

Serving Burlington, Hamilton, Oakville, Milton, Mississauga, St. Catharines and surrounding areas.

Why Am I Emotionally Unstable or Unavailable?

Our emotional stability has a lot to do with emotional resilience which is a combination of nurture versus nature, but nature in early development of the child both in utero and after birth plays a major role as the perception of its environment is taken on by the nature of the child or genes if you will.  This study and theory is known as epigenetics.  

In neo-natal state, new born, the child begins learning at a rapid rate through its environmental stimulus, its surroundings.  The child learns how their mother and father respond to their environmental stimulus whether safe or unsafe.  Studies of this nature have been observed by a growing number of scientists and those in the medical field some of them include Dr. Bruce Lipton, Dr. Daniel Siegel, Dr. Pat Ogden, Dr. Nigel Plummer, and significantly Dr. Stephen Porges, and some others.  

Brain wave states of learning and consciousness

Brain waves are measured by using EEG readings also known as electroencephalography.  There are four main waves to be observed:  Delta, Theta, Alpha, and Beta.

Ages of development corresponding to brain waves found in the developing brain are as follows:

Birth – 2 years of age is when Delta waves are observed which are 0.5-4 Hz.  In this stage of development their level of consciousness is more like an sleep like state when dreams occur.  That is why some people report that their memories of this stage in life is questionable and often wonder if they imagined it or if it really happened.  Memory is there and needs to be understood when it comes to life events and how it might have impacted you into adulthood.

2 – 6 years of age is when Theta waves are seen and become dominant which are 4-8 Hz and their level of consciousness is much like a half asleep to half awake adult state.  In the Theta brainwave state children are very imaginative and can live out make believe scenarios, where creativity, insights and daydreaming are the norm.

6-8 years of age is when Alpha brainwaves become observable and functional which is a frequency of 8-13 Hz.  In this state is when we experience physical and mental relaxation.  For a child though they are not quite aware of things as yet especially of time, such as yesterday, today and tomorrow or when you tell them to wait a minute they think it is never.  

8-12 years of age is when Beta brainwaves become observable and functional which is a frequency of 13-32 Hz.  When the brain matures to this level then the child will begin to become consciously alert, and will engage in active thinking.  For example that is when they can begin to engage in active and meaningful conversation, begin to make decisions, problem solving, focusing on a task and able to begin learning a new concept.  This is the beginning of conscious and analytical thinking.

The brain matures somewhere around the age of 25 but has a number of changes throughout our life.  What we do in adulthood determines whether or not we can attain to peace, hope, satisfaction, and contentment. 

What may have had an imperfect childhood does not mean that you are doomed there is hope for you.  The beauty of the brain is that it can be changed but it does take a number of therapeutic interventions to make this happen.

Changing our behaviour 

In childhood our behaviour is programmed through what Dr. Bruce Lipton calls “a simple stimulus-response mechanism.”  We learn from outward perceptions, parental behaviours, parental emotional states, parental attachment styles, which includes even complex social interactions.  All of these things contribute to the programming of a child’s subconscious behaviour which causes them to conform to the beliefs of their community or social world, specifically their “family life”.

Why am I so emotionally unstable?

The question “Why am I so emotionally unstable?”  is a loaded question as it can have many reasons some of which can include:

• in utero emotional upsets of the mother
• mother’s use of drugs or substances before and during pregnancy
• lack of emotional attunement to the child 
• lack of healthy parental response to a child’s distress
• traumatic events such as war, rape, drugs, terrorism, parental conflicts, yelling, swearing, physical violence, emotional drama, hysteria, parental PTSD, poverty, loss of loved ones, loss of security such as homelessness, and much more.

You can have emotional resiliency and stability through therapies like EMDR.  James Miklos is a Certified EMDR Therapist and can help you to move forward.  Contact us today and book your appointment to help you to move forward.  

For us to better function better in our life, marriage, and work we need to be able to identify emotions.

Life Enhancing Emotions 

We can now observe the opposites to these emotions:  

• Guilt and shame is opposite to Pride
• Self-pity to Gratitude
• Disgust to Happiness
• Fear to Curiosity
• Anger to Compassion
• Sadness and grief to Loved

Pride

There are a few definitions for pride but in this case we are understanding it in the context of self-respect where good feelings of pleasure, satisfaction, admiration and delight that arises out of ones accomplishments, abilities, qualities, and possessions that one has.  We get energy and thrive when we experience the good that comes from us, our talents and achievements.  When we feel proud we want to keep doing it and keep doing better and if we need to problem solve we can better tackle it.  This also gives us self-confidence.  Pride gives us confidence where we want to shine and be seen where guilt and shame compels us to feel less than where we want to withdraw and hide and possibly lie.

Gratitude

When we experience something good that is around us, given to us, or done for us we experience and feel appreciation.  The pleasure of contentment of benefits received.  Gratitude is something that we feel when we recognize good that has come to us and is expressed through words of appreciation and thanks.  We could also described it as when we are pleased.  When people are stuck in self-pity or a victim mentality all too often they cannot experience gratitude.  New studies have shown that gratitude is liberating and therapeutic in nature as are all Life Enhancing Emotions or Positive Emotions.  Self-pity is about self and the internal expense of ones self where you are the focus where gratitude is about others and the things around us, it is external and where the focus is on the good of creation, others, and what we have.

Happiness

Happiness comes from experiences that are pleasurable and have brought us contentment, joy, it is a state of well-being and contentment.  There are various levels of happiness that can range from contentment to ecstasy and euphoria.  When we enjoy something the experience regenerates us and refreshes us and promotes well being.  As in all emotions there are healthy and unhealthy sources and expressions of them.  Happiness draws that person, object or experience closer to ones self where disgust strongly rejects the such.

Curiosity

The emotion of curiosity is a complex one, but simply put it is the desire to learn and to know.  This emotion arises when we have a sense of safety and a hunger to grow as a person, this is more a felt sense.  Science has shown us that our brain makes new cells whenever we have a stimulating environment to think, feel, learn, hear, see, taste, touch, smell, and do something.  Unlike lust curiosity’s desire is to learn.  Curiosity is when we want to figure things out where we are inquisitive.  Curiosity moves forward where fear withdraws.

Compassion

Being compassionate or loving is a feeling we have towards others which helps us to grow and helps others to grow.  Compassion also helps us to feel satisfied and calm.  Compassion is a feeling and expression that touches our environment and others around us.  Compassion or loving is an emotional expression of great care, fondness, devotion, adoration, affection, warmth tenderness, mercy, understanding and concern.  Just like holding in or pushing away anger or sadness is not healthy for us neither is holding in compassion or feelings of love.  Love isn’t love until you give it away as the saying goes.  We feel it a greater more rewarding way when we allow ourselves to feel and express compassion and love.  Unlike anger that fights compassion helps and aids.  

Loved

When we feel loved we feel important and special which is meaningful to us because we feel nurtured and nourished in our sense of self.  When we feel loved we then begin to attach to another person.  We feel cherished where we feel held in deep affection.  When we feel loved we feel attracted and attractive to those who are loving and caring for us.  We feel connected to other people.  Healthy touch is a loving touch that is nourishing to our mind and body.  It is found that Oxytocin is secreted when we are touched in a loving way.  Loving touch is calming.  Loving words and and looks cause us to feel important and loved and loveable we are.  When we feel loved we grow stronger in our sense of self, securer in a relationship, where we can thrive where in contrast when we experience sadness and grief we feel weaker, less secure, more unstable, an emptiness and as though something has died or is dying in us.

Positive emotions or life enhancing emotions are a gift from above and when we are able to experience them more we are healthier, live longer, have better relationships, and become more resilient in life.  We need to work on these things and we can do that through therapies such as:

>> EMDR Therapy

>> Emotional Freedom Techniques Therapy

>> Psychosomatic Energetics 

>> Fraser’s Dissociative Table Technique 

At New Hope Counselling Centre we have the compassion, the hope and importantly the therapeutic approach that can help you to improve your happiness, marriage, healthy living, bringing you hope for a better tomorrow.  Call us today!

Serving Burlington, Hamilton, Oakville, Milton, Mississauga, St. Catharines and surrounding areas.

Are emotions and feelings the same?

There are many words to describe how we feel but feelings are not the same as emotions.  Feelings can be described as emotions plus cognitions which equals feelings.  Emotions are core Nervous system and Limbic system responses that are physically felt.  The more we can become attuned to our body the more we can experience and be connected to our emotions for the purpose of healing and living life to the fullest.  

SUDS scale helps us to identify the intensity of what we are feeling

Although there are basic emotions that can be identified but further to that emotions can be understood in their intensity through the use of  adjectives that gives us the clues as to its intensity and quality.  To further and better quantify our emotions it is best to use what is called the SUDS scale or the Subjective Units of Disturbance Scale.  Through the use of this scale we can better subjectively and experientially determine what our emotional experience is like.  The scale starts at 0, which means totally calm and peaceful but yet fully aware sliding all the way up to 10 which represents the most intense of emotions.

What are the basic emotions?

There are many prevailing theories and observations, but I will share my thoughts concerning this subject as a clinician in my next post, Understanding Basic Emotions.

Gradients of emotions

When we experience emotions we do not experience only one at a time.  According to the senior researcher Dacher Keltner and faculty director of the Greater Good Science Center he states that through their research that there are 27 dimensions of distinct emotional experiences found when a study of 800 men were you used as they watched over 2,000 video clips that were developed by researchers.  In other words we experience emotional states that are quite colourful and complex rather than experiencing emotions one at a time as in isolation.  We experience emotions in different intensities and in different combinations.

Emotions are powerful!  They are a part of our vital force our soul but when they are in disarray then we can experience many unpleasant things like depression, anxiety, PTSD, OCD, and anger management issues.  To better understand yourself and develop emotional self-regulation such therapies listed below will help us with just that:

>> EMDR Therapy

>> Homeopathy 

At New Hope Counselling Centre we can help you to improve your mood and emotions as well as the quality of your relationships.  We offer you hope for a better tomorrow.  Call us today!

Serving Burlington, Hamilton, Oakville, Milton, Mississauga, St. Catharines and surrounding areas.

The Practice of Gratitude

More and more people are beginning to realize the power of practicing gratitude.  There have been a number of studies researched, performed and published in the last two decades by such prestigious institutions such as Berkeley, Harvard, and Stanford.  Though the practice of gratitude and its benefits have been known and practiced in a number of religions throughout time.

Gratitude is not just a nice notion or polite expression but is essential to our physical, mental, emotional and spiritual health and wellbeing.  Without gratitude we see an increase in sickness, depression, suicide, anxiety, anger, conflict, violence, divorces, social and moral decay.  Gratitude does not directly solve life’s problems but rather it empowers a person to find a new perspective, giving hope it creates contentment, empowers a person to problem solve, a grateful person attracts friendships and favour, and enables divine intervention for what some might call luck.

The practice of gratitude does not have to be complex, nor tedious but like any good habit it takes a quality decision to change your behaviour by creating a new internal as well as external habit, just like brushing your teeth.  Once this habit is formed than like all other habits it becomes permanent.  Those of us who are not in the habit of being very grateful we learned the habit of ungratefulness and complaining probably from the home environment that you grew up in.  For your sake choose to change habits from one of ungratefulness and complaining to one of gratitude.  

The following gratitude practice my wife and I began cultivating over 35 years ago that helped us get out of a state of fear and hopelessness when we were in dire straits.  We began practicing gratitude from a spiritual perspective which also released divine intervention for us, which got us out of our dilemma at the time.

Steps to Practicing Gratitude

Twice daily practice gratitude beginning in the morning then in the evening of each day doing the following.  Start by picking a room in your home or outdoors where you can begin.

1.  Begin to vocalize out loud what you are grateful for in your surroundings.  Be detailed.  (This is an act of recognizing the good things in your life and surroundings in the given moment of that space and time that you are currently in).  Speaking your gratitude vocally is essential for numerous reasons.

2.  Be sure to vocalize it with emotional engagement and mindfulness.  Use such statements as:   “I’m grateful for…”.  “Thank you (Creator, God, Father, Jesus, etc.) for…”. “I love (the smell of the flowers)…” 

3.  Involve your 5 physical senses by expressing your gratitude in the following exercise:   “I am grateful for…” 3 things that you see, “I am grateful for…” 3 things that you hear, “I am grateful for…” 3 things that you smell, “I am grateful for…” 3 things that you touch or feel (name them out loud with purposed feelings of gratefulness).

4.  Practice this vocal act of gratitude for at least 5 minutes twice daily.

5.  When you are nearly finished sit in your environment as comfortably as you can and begin breathing according to the heart coherence technique.  (Breathing in and through your heart about the centre of your chest, smooth breathing through your nose only, notice those things you have just vocalized that you are grateful for, particularly one item).

6.  When completed notice your body and its stillness.

7.  Slowly begin moving keeping yourself in that mental and physiological state as much as possible.

8.  Throughout the day turn your attention to your practice of gratitude and what you have noticed earlier that day.

It is important to note that though the practice of gratitude is essential and even necessary to our wellbeing it is only a piece of the puzzle towards a healthy you and a healthy life.  Find out more by checking out our services that can empower your life. 

>> EMDR Therapy

>> Homeopathy 

At New Hope Counselling Centre we can help you to improve your happiness, mental health, marriage, healthy living, bringing you hope for a better tomorrow.  Call us today!

Serving Burlington, Hamilton, Oakville, Milton, Mississauga, St. Catharines and surrounding areas.

Women need to feel from their husband a gentle feeling of fondness; affection if you will.  They crave gentleness, tenderness, warmth, devotion, endearment, where they feel cared for.

Affection can be expressed in numerous ways.  Some of these ways can include: physical, non-sexual affection like hugs, kisses, holding of the hands, a gentle touch as you are near her.  Other ways can include a gentle tone of voice, words that create in her a sense of endearment.  Gifts given and helping out can express this as well but in a more limited sense when it comes to affection.  Affection needs to be intimate and emotionally connecting, meaning, it needs to be from sincerity of the heart.  (Find out more how you can have the marriage you dreamed of).

I have found that women generally desire and appreciate affection in one of three ways:

1. Physical non-sexual touch
2. Verbal words of love and affirmation
3. Both of the above

Physical Touch

Few key points will help you to understand what your partner needs and how to meet it.  Some men have reported to me that their wife doesn’t respond well to non-sexual touch, there are numerous reasons for this.  A few of these reasons can be that your timing is off, for example she is in the kitchen getting supper ready and you approach her from behind and want to express affection to her but she rejects you or ignores you, your timing needs to improve as well as your communication.  Remember just because you want it doesn’t mean that your partner does at that moment.  Communication such as asking her before you touch, waiting for the right moment when she’s done her task then approach her.  Remember women do not like it when men just want sex or are emotionally needy and that’s why they are touching them.

Intimate touch can also include things like direct eye contact with a look of love.  A loving gaze into each others eyes is important, even a loving playful wink, or blowing of a kiss.

physical affection can also include:

• kissing
• nibbling on your partner’s ear
• playing footsies
• briefly rubbing your partner’s back
• holding hands
• sitting close to each other where you are making physical contact with each other
• cuddling
• hugging
• ticking your spouse’s arm
• walking with each other’s arms around each other’s waist

Physical closeness and healthy touches of endearment are crucial to igniting love in your marriage and definitely in your wife.

Words of Affection

Words of affection involve predominantly two areas of expression.

1.   Praise – Words of praise involve the expression of gratitude and affection concerning things that she does.  Things like, “You are an amazing cook!”  “You always dress nice.”  “You are always so good at organizing.”  “You are a good mother to my children.”  The list goes on and on, but the key point here is that these words of expression are directed towards telling her all the amazing things she does.

2.   Adoration – Words of adoration involve expressions of love for who she is rather than what she has done.  Such words can be, “I love your blue eyes.”  “You are so beautiful.”  “I love your cute smile.”  “The way you walk is so elegant.”  “You are brilliant.”  There are numerous choices of such expressions you can say to her.  Words of adoration are important because each woman wants to feel that she is the centre of your universe.

Conclusion

Just like sexual intimacy is a man’s number one need so is affection for women.  Without affection a woman will not respond well and her number one need won’t be met.  Yes, there are other key factors to meeting your wife’s needs but his one is number one.  Often men need to be coached along these lines which then helps them to succeed and end up with a marriage that is filled with passionate love.

For more on Marriage Counselling click here

Written by: James A. Miklos, M.C.C., R.P. -   James has been counselling,  and providing psychotherapy for over 30 years, is a public speaker and writer.

© 2025 James A. Miklos. All rights reserved.  To copy or quote any of this material this entire citation and credit must be posted.