Do We Really Need to Talk About Our Feelings?

Picture this: You’re sitting on some comfy oversized couch, the soft yellow glow of a salt lamp illuminating the room. A yellow-green plant sits in the corner that is somehow still alive. You feel tears in the corners of your eyes as you stare at the box of tissues suspiciously placed nearby. Your voice cracks as you say, “And the worst part was they left my text on read!” You fall silent and clench your fists. The therapist tilts their head and hits you with the dreaded question: “And how does that make you feel?”

You can’t help but roll your eyes. You just spent ten minutes explaining an incredibly complicated situation involving three unanswered text messages, only to be met with the most cliché therapy phrase. It feels almost comically clear that the answer is so obvious: “How do you THINK it makes me feel? Bad! Next question.”

And honestly, that’s fair. As humans, we spend a lot of time telling the story of what happened when we are hurt. We explain what they did and why they did it. We compare their actions to our own. We talk about what we think they meant and why we reacted. But we can also get stuck trying to replay the conversation over and over, analyzing the situation and trying to find a solution. Until finally we dismiss it in hopes of moving on.

But what if you tried something different? Accelerated Experiential Dynamic Psychotherapy, or AEDP, asks us to do exactly that: Try something different. Which is why it has become my favorite modality to use in my therapy work. With AEDP, the focus becomes less about the story and more about what’s happening behind it. The focus shifts from solving to experiencing.    

Take the unanswered text message scenario. You know it made you feel bad. In my work with AEDP, you are asked to notice what really feels bad about it. Maybe after a short pause, your gut reaction is to check your phone. And there it is, something worth noticing. That visceral urge to check your phone is telling you something, which matters just as much as what is said. Your body reacted before you even had a chance to speak. Every shift can tell you something about yourself in a way that words can’t always encapsulate. When you work with an AEDP, one of our goals is to understand what made you shift. Together, we would slow down and process what prompted you to check your phone. Maybe it was the sense of unease. Maybe you felt distressed. Whatever the reason may be, it was your experience, and that is important.

But in order to understand your experience, AEDP slows down the story and asks us to pay attention to our reactions. Sometimes those reactions show up as sensations. Maybe it’s a million thoughts racing through your mind or the feeling of your chest tightening. Those sensations tell us something about what we are feeling. And when we begin to give those feelings a name, such as anger or fear, we can start to release some of the tension. This helps them to feel less overwhelming. With AEDP, we make space for those feelings. We let them be present and linger. Sometimes feelings make us want to cry or scream. And instead of pushing them away, we consider allowing them to be here. By allowing those emotions to be here, we are allowing them to be experienced and expressed in a way that feels safe.

Because safety is at the root of healing, you don’t have to feel those feelings alone. This is represented in the concept of “undoing aloneness.” When you work with me, I will be there if the bad feelings get too scary. I will be there to remind you that you don’t have to go through this alone, because you are worthy of healing. Because yes, it is possible, and you are more than capable of it. Together we are working to build a new experience. And over time, you can build a new way of relating to yourself and your emotions. AEDP can even help build a new way of relating to other people.

The whole process, from slowing down to allowing ourselves to feel, is exactly what drew me to utilize AEDP. I have experienced this process myself as a client. I have been on the other side. I have sat in that therapy chair just like you, and I know how scary it may feel to be faced with bad feelings, but with AEDP I found that healing is possible, even in my own journey. Being able to slow down and pay attention to the shifts we make during difficult moments allows for emotions to be present. We can learn what it’s like to have a new experience where awful feelings feel less bad. AEDP helps us to be able to notice things about ourselves that we are sometimes oblivious to when we are so caught up in the story. Because AEDP is more than exploring what hurts, it is about our natural capacity to heal when we have the safety and support to do so.

So maybe the next time you hear “And how does that make you feel?” you’ll still roll your eyes, because the real question is, “What happens if I feel?”