My Feelings Used to Scare Me. Now I See Them as the Gateway to Living With Integrity and Purpose.

Many of us grew up learning that emotions are something to fear or avoid. We’re taught to “be strong,” to suppress what we feel, or to believe that sensitivity is a flaw. Years ago, I told a therapist, “If I feel my feelings, I’m afraid I’ll end up in the hospital.” She replied, “If you don’t feel your feelings, you’ll end up in the hospital.”

At the time, I didn’t understand. Now I do.

What we resist persists.What we bury comes out sideways.

When we don’t acknowledge what’s alive in our bodies—fear, grief, anger, anxiety, longing—it shows up in other ways: burnout, addiction, people-pleasing, reactive choices, overwhelm, emotional shutdown, or the quiet despair of living someone else’s life.

Volunteering inside the prison system, I see this truth reflected. Many people never learned how to understand their emotions or needs. Without tools, they reacted from pain rather than connection — often with enormous consequences.

While my story is different, the emotional pattern underneath was the same.

The Strategies That Keep Us Safe… Until They Don’t

I reached a point in my life where the strategies that once protected me no longer worked. Over-functioning. Appeasing. Avoiding conflict. Blowing up after holding everything in. Abandoning myself to keep the peace.

These weren’t random behaviors. They were strategies I used because they met important needs — belonging, safety, stability, love, acceptance, predictability.

The problem wasn’t the needs.The problem was the strategy.

These coping patterns protected me when I was young…but as an adult, they kept me small.

They didn’t move me toward the life I wanted — only deeper into the life I already had. I was trying to meet beautiful needs through strategies that were never capable of fulfilling them.

Something in me knew there had to be another way.

The Turning Point

I found Nonviolent Communication (NVC) when I was craving understanding, peace, emotional honesty, and a grounded way of relating that didn’t involve suppressing my feelings until I eventually exploded.

NVC helped me see the truth behind every action I took — even the ones that hurt me:

Every behavior was an attempt to meet a need.

And that realization was profoundly liberating.

I wasn’t broken.

I wasn’t wrong.

I wasn’t failing.

I was simply using strategies that no longer aligned with the woman I was becoming.

NVC helped me look beneath old patterns and see what was driving them all along:a longing for connection, a desire to belong, a need to feel valued, and ultimately, a need for safety and love.

It taught me to feel my feelings not as weaknesses, but as signals — pointing me toward my needs.

Feelings point to needs.

Needs guide our choices.

Needs show us what honors our soul.

Coming Home to Myself

Through this work, I discovered that certain needs were non-negotiable for me: peace, autonomy, clarity, authenticity, self-trust, and ease. Not luxuries — foundations.

When I honored them, everything began to shift.

Instead of people-pleasing, I chose honesty.Instead of abandoning myself, I chose alignment.Instead of shrinking, I chose presence.Instead of overriding my intuition, I chose to trust it.

Now, I check in with myself regularly:

• What am I feeling?

• What need is underneath this feeling?

• Is this honoring the woman I want to be?

• What is my body telling me?

• Is this aligned with the life I’m creating?

This practice changed how I relate, how I communicate, how I work, and how I show up.

Why This Work Matters

NVC shaped me in ways I never expected. It helped me understand that every choice — even the painful ones — was driven by a need worthy of compassion. It showed me that when we choose strategies that truly meet our needs, our lives shift from the inside out.

This is why NVC is the foundation of my coaching practice. Not because it’s “just” a communication model, but because it is a framework for living consciously — a path toward emotional clarity, empowered choice, and deep alignment.

A path toward:

✨ Authenticity✨ Peace✨ Self-honoring✨ Freedom✨ Sustainable relationships✨ Joy

The Journey Forward

This work is a lifelong journey — a returning, a remembering, a reconnecting. It asks us to soften old stories, meet our feelings and needs with compassion, and communicate with presence. Over time, this creates a life rooted in authenticity, meaningful connection, and inner freedom.

And because it is a journey, I still slip into old patterns. I still make mistakes. I still react in familiar ways. There is no finish line — only the ongoing practice of noticing, pausing, recalibrating, and choosing again.

My wish is that each of us learns to tune into our feelings and allow them to gently guide us toward our needs — and to honor whatever we find there. When we give ourselves permission to feel and to listen, our lives begin to align in the most natural, authentic, and honest way.

We start living a life we actually enjoy — choosing what we want rather than acting from fear, obligation, or habit. The byproduct of this is a more peaceful, joyful, grounded way of being, where our choices come from clarity instead of pressure.

May you be courageous, one small step at a time, to listen to your soul’s whispers — and I promise you, it will lead you to a life you not only like, but absolutely love.