Saving Your Marriage from Conflict: Understand the Difference between Emotions and Feelings

In discussing the third cause of conflict, we must first make a clear distinction between positive and negative emotions or feelings. In Adlerian philosophy, emotions are described as negative feelings, and are regarded as negative in the sense that they are socially disruptive, degrading us and harming others. Feelings, on the other hand, may be described as positive emotions. They are socially constructive and benefit both ourselves and others. Destructive emotions make living together a negative experience, while positive feelings are joyful and uplifting and their highest expression is love — real love, and not what is often understood by the word today. Love within the microcosm of a couple is the first step towards universal, spiritual love. Theologians sometimes speak of four kinds of love.

For those who have religious faith, on the highest level is the love God has for Himself, which human beings will never be able to understand. Then comes God's love for us, the source of all the love in creation. The love we may have for God is the third type of love; this is the origin of our love for our fellow 'men’, for humankind. If we believe in God, we believe ourselves unable to love all people impartially, for their own sakes, without God's help, as He created us all and loves us all equally. The fourth form of love is the love that human beings have for each other, which can assume a spiritual dimension.

There is nothing love cannot face; there is no limit to its faith, its hope, and its endurance.
New English Bible, I Corinthians 13:7

Love like this does not come automatically. We have to learn it, like walking and speaking. It comes from selflessness, trust and respect.

Love is the means for the greatest contribution to another person, the surrender of everything that one has and is, the most upright expression of the longing to belong.
Rudolf Dreikurs (a leading Adlerian counsellor)

Yet why is this true, pure love so much rarer than our negative emotions? It is because true love requires courage, and we live in a discouraging world.

Negative emotions are the personal, poisonous, self—centred feelings that have their roots in a sense of inferiority; they represent an impulsive reaction, an exaggerated response, to a person's environment. Animals feel such emotions too, whereas only human beings are capable of true spiritual love. Emotional people react immediately in an impulsive, primitive way because they are not confident of being able to achieve their aim with any other means at their disposal. Most people are reluctant to believe this, because being emotional and giving easy vent to one's feelings is fashionable nowadays; the majority of modern novels, plays and films lay great emphasis on the impulsive expression of emotions. It is important to differentiate here between impulsiveness and spontaneity: impulsiveness is self-centred, negative and brings conflict, whereas spontaneity is outgoing, positive and brings harmony. Our reluctance to curb our impulsiveness is easily explained, because it provides an excellent excuse for destructive and antisocial behaviour. But we must make such distinctions and learn to control our emotions if we want to become more human and to live in a gentler, more peaceful world.

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