Emotions Aren’t Holding Us Back, Their The Map

Thankyou Kaylah for the drawing!!

Understanding the Purpose of Your Emotions

If you’ve ever wished you could just turn off your feelings for a bit — congratulations, you’re human. But before you mentally pack your emotions onto a rocket and launch them into space, let’s talk about what they’re actually trying to do for you.

Because here’s the truth: Every feeling you have is good.

That doesn’t mean they’re all pleasant, but each emotion is trying to tell you something important about your world in the moment. Without them, you’d be lost — like a GPS that only says, “You’re fine, just keep driving” (until you end up in a lake).

The Myth of “Good” and “Bad” Emotions

A lot of us grow up hearing that some emotions are “good” (happy, calm, excited) and others are “bad” (anger, sadness, fear). Put mildly, that’s BS. Emotions aren’t moral — they’re messages. Saying some feelings are “bad” sets us up to avoid them, because it’s natural to try to get away from bad things. It also gives us an impossible expectation that we should strive to always feel “good”. And just thinking about trying to do that exhausts me.

In reality, our emotional life is a full range, and every feeling is trying to be helpful by telling us something about our situation in that moment.

But here’s the tricky part: emotions don’t always deliver their messages calmly. They don’t arrive as polite emails — they can barge open the door, yell their message, and stomp around until you pay attention.

That’s why I like to think of emotions as little kids on a bus— noisy, insistent, but ultimately just trying to communicate and help the only way they know how.

The Bus Metaphor: Who’s Actually Driving?

Imagine you’re driving a bus — it’s your life, and you’re steering it toward the kind of person you want to be.

But your bus is full of passengers: all the different parts of you, including your feelings. Now  picture all these parts of you as emotional little kids — because, honestly, that’s how emotions behave sometimes.

When a feeling has a message, it’s like one of those kids running up while you’re driving: “HEY! LOOK AT MY DRAWING! LOOK AT MY DRAWING!” (a.k.a. ‘Hey, something needs your attention!’)

You can:

❌       Ignore it. (It won’t go away. It’ll just get louder. You ever tried that with a kid… see, same thing!)

❌       Let it drive the bus. (Warning: Emotions don’t have a licence — they will run things over or crash into things!)

✔️       Or you can acknowledge it, listen to it’s message, and stay in the driver’s seat. (Also an effective strategy with kids!)

That’s the goal: acknowledge, understand, and choose your next move consciously.

Meet the Passengers: The Five Umbrella Emotions

If you’ve seen Inside Out, you’ll recognise some of the passengers already — Happy (Joy), Sadness, Anger, Fear, and Disgust. Pixar captured them perfectly. These aren’t just movie characters; they represent the five umbrella emotions psychologists often talk about. Every emotion we experience is related to one of these colourful characters. Like one giant family… and weirdly similar to my extended family now that I think about it

Each one has a purpose. They’re not bad passengers — they’re just loud sometimes, especially when they have something important to say.

When we understand what each emotion is trying to tell us, it become easier to listen to everyone on your bus — even the grumpy ones — without letting them grab the wheel.

Emotion	The Message
Happy	“I like this — I want more!”
Sadness	“I don’t like this — I want less.”
Anger	“This is not fair — I want it to change.”
Fear (Anxiety/Scared)	“I’m uncertain or in danger- I want to be safe.”
Disgust	“This is bad for me — I want something different.”

Every emotion is trying to help you, tell you something about your world. Even the uncomfortable ones. They’re not your enemies — they’re your friends… just the type that are providing constant unsolicited advice 😊

Stay Driving: Three Steps to Working With Emotions (Instead of Against Them)

Emotions aren’t meant to be controlled, avoided, or blindly obeyed. They’re meant to help guide us. Over the years I've developed a simple framework I like to teach people to help manage ANY emotion that comes up. It involves 3 steps:

1. Name It

Pause and identify what you’re feeling. Saying it out loud — “I’m feeling anxious” — actually tells your brain, “Message received.” This often reduces the intensity straight away.

2. Understand It

Ask: What’s this feeling trying to tell me? Each emotion's message will always link to it's core theme— fairness, safety, connection, pleasure, values etc.

3. Address the Need

Once you know the message, ask: What do I need right now? What will move me towards what matters. Sometimes it’s a practical fix (plan, rest, talk it out), and other times it’s simply allowing yourself to feel without judgment.

Emotion	The Message	The Need (these are just examples!)
Happy	“I like this — I want more!”	Notice what’s working. Build more of it (but don’t chase it blindly — addictions live here).
Sadness	“I don’t like this — I want less.”	Maybe something’s missing, needs distancing or a level of acceptance. It might be that you need connection (Lonely) or allow yourself to grieve (Loss).
Anger	“This is not fair — I want it to change.”	Identify the injustice. Set boundaries or take action to create change — but don’t hand anger the steering wheel, their solution usually involves running people over!
Fear (Anxiety/Scared)	“I’m uncertain or in danger- I want to be safe.”	Take a step back and ensure you’re safe, brainstorm ways to reduce assumptions and increase certainty. Sometimes that means planning, sometimes soothing, and sometimes it means doing the exact opposite of what anxiety would do if they had the steering wheel.
Disgust	“This is bad for me — I want it different.”	Align with your values. If it’s guilt or shame, it’s about behaving closer to who you want to be. Plan a way to course correct.
Stress/Overwhelm	“I have too much going on- I want it to change.”	Demands are outweighing resources. Map out what you have going on. Then break it down, delegate, or make a plan.
Lonely	“I don’t like I'm not connected — I want less of that.”	Get connected. Reach out to someone, make a phone call, send a message, arrange a catch up.

Final Thought: Let the Feelings Ride, but Keep Your Hands on the Wheel

Your emotions aren’t here to sabotage you — they’re here to guide you.

The goal isn’t to silence them, and it’s not to obey everything they say. It’s to listen, understand, and choose your actions intentionally.

Because when you stop fighting your emotions and start listening to them, you realise something powerful:

Your emotions aren’t the problem — they’re the map.