The Tao of Fully Feeling: Harvesting Forgiveness out of Blame

by Pete Walker

have all developed the art of not experiencing feelings, for a child can only experience his feelings when there is somebody there who accepts him

fully, understands and supports him. If that is missing, if the child must risk losing the mother’s love, or that of her substitute, then he cannot experience these feelings secretly “just for himself” but fails to experience them at all.

“The only pain that can be avoided is the pain that comes from trying to avoid unavoidable pain.”

Feelings and emotions are energetic states that do not magically dissipate when they are ignored. Much of our unnecessary emotional pain is the distressing pressure that comes from not releasing emotional energy.

When we do not attend to our feelings, they accumulate inside us and create a mounting anxiety that we commonly dismiss as stress. Stress is not merely a detrimental physiological