On Feelings
The modern view on feelings is leading millions of people astray from the Truth.
Modern psychology would have us all validate the feelings that we experience, and if they are thus valid, then they are correct.
Not so.
This is detrimental to the human being, for feelings are whims - they come and go like the seasons.
Specifically as a man, you must do what you know you must do regardless of how you “feel” in the moment. There is little truth to our feelings, for they shift on a minute by minute basis. From one moment to the next, one environment to the other, feelings morph and change to match the environment and the circumstances we find ourselves in.
What most don’t believe is that our feelings can be whatever we want them to be, and, we are able to choose how we feel about everything in this life. It is as such that we have chosen to be sad or down - and it is on us to choose to be happy.
Perhaps the greatest revelation we can come to grips with is that our feelings and thoughts are not our own.
Previously, I would have “experiences” with that which I believed myself to be God, but the truth is that I have no idea if that which I was experiencing was of God or of the demons. I thought that because it was my experience and that I can define my experiences as that which suits me, then they surely must be true, right?
Not even close.
The fact is that I was tremendously unwise to believe that I was the ultimate master of my mind, and even though I constantly fell subject to sin (specifically lust as my most obvious stumbling block), that I was somehow more advanced and capable of spiritual discernment. My pride was talking!
Those that would follow their feelings for guidance in any situation will be led astray again and again.
You don’t “feel like working out” yet it is precisely that which you should do.
You don’t “feel like reading scripture” yet you will be strengthening your closeness to God in doing so.
You don’t “feel like eating the healthy meal instead of the pizza and ice cream” yet you know that you’ll feel and operate better if you pick the healthy option.
You don’t “feel like going to church to stand for two hours” yet it is the way to remind you what all of “this” is.
Most often the things that we do not feel like doing are the things that actually allow us to feel better in the long run.
And if you choose to take the “out” and go with your feelings instead with what you know you should be doing - you will feel WORSE off due to guilt or shame that wasn’t even there before.
These things that we should be doing may be “less stimulating” than the short term dopamine hit that is so pervasive in our culture today. Scratch that, they almost always are less stimulating.
But they are the things that actually last and allow us long term satisfaction - they are that which will be meaningful in the long run.
In the Church, we do not truly give much validity to feelings, for we are skeptical that our feelings are even from us or some influence outside ourselves. When we see that which the modern “mental health” landscape has become, it is a wasteland of validated feelings that do not actually solve a thing; it is a field day for the narcissist.
If our feelings are all that matter, then we will destroy the world around us to make the world see us as that which we believe ourselves to be.
Instead of that which God Himself created us to be.
So, the next time you feel like skipping that workout or church, know that you will be glad that you did it anyway. The next time that you feel down or that the world is a dark place, choose to see the light.
It is as such that we can find joy in the depth of great pain and dispair, it is in such that we can be grateful for everything that happens to us, and it is as such that we can finally find the inner peace that we have so desperately seeking.
Do not listen to your feelings.
Only listen to God.
He is the one constant, the one thing, - the one person - that will never lead us astray.