The Language of Emotions (Revised and Updated)

What Your Feelings Are Trying to Tell You

By: Karla McLaren M.Ed

Narrated by: Karla McLaren M.Ed

Length: 20 hrs and 29 mins

Publisher's summary

Featuring significant updates, the new edition of this beloved book takes listeners to the heart of each emotion’s powerful gifts and messages.

Every emotion—even shame, anger, and anxiety—brings us vital information and wisdom. Emotions—especially the unwanted and dishonored ones—hold a tremendous amount of energy. “Too often, we either repress our feelings or let them run wild,” says researcher and educator Karla McLaren. “What many of us were never taught are the fundamental skills for honoring and understanding our profound, powerful emotions.” In this new edition of The Language of Emotions, McLaren takes us much deeper than naming or managing our feelings—she teaches us to listen to the messages within each emotion, reflect on their questions, and incorporate their wisdom into our lives.

Enhanced through more than a decade of research and teaching, this edition offers a time-tested emotional guidebook, including:

• How to safely feel and identify emotions—especially the most intense ones

• Practices for working with feelings—including setting boundaries, grounding, and the healing power of complaining consciously

• Building your empathy—five key skills for awakening your emotional genius

• The role of emotions in the resolution of trauma

• Decoding the unique messages, gifts, and insights carried by each emotion

• New to this edition: insights and practices on anxiety, an exploration of loneliness, and much more

Learning the language of our emotions can deepen our self-understanding, improve our intuition, and enhance our relationships. “Emotions aren’t problems to be solved,” teaches McLaren. “If you learn their language, your emotions can become an indispensable source of vitality, personal growth, and profound healing.”

©2023 Karla McLaren (P)2023 Sounds True

Critic reviews

“Karla McLaren’s revised and updated book, The Language of Emotions, presents a model for understanding emotions and explores the positive aspects of anxiety. Karla uses her lived experience of trauma to inform her readers in ways that may enable them to achieve the emotional understanding necessary to learn from and move beyond their past. There is no doubt that Karla’s passion to help her readers understand emotions, and provide them with useful tools to do so, makes this new edition of her book a gift for those who are suffering from or grappling with what they feel.”—Mary Lamia, PhD, author of Grief Isn’t Something to Get Over and Understanding Myself

“Karla McLaren’s book The Language of Emotions is the first I will recommend to survivors of traumatic and abusive environments and relationships. Karla’s knowledge of how to understand emotions and engage with them in a positive and healing way is an invaluable resource.”—Janja Lalich, PhD, author of Take Back Your Life and Bounded Choice

“Karla McLaren’s unique, empathic view of emotions surprisingly revalues even the most ‘negative’ emotions and opens pathways to understanding the depths of the human soul.”—Michael Meade, author of The World Behind the World and The Water of Life

An important step to understand life by understanding emotions

I enjoyed listening to this book. It classifies emotions well, highlighting their characteristics and the importance of recognizing them. The book also explores how we often misunderstand emotions and offers practical ways to understand and heal our relationship with each one. Coming from someone with rich life experiences, the author speaks beautifully.

In a world where morality is often dictated by teachers who advocate avoiding certain emotions, this book provides clarity on the consequences of bypassing emotions. It offers practical methods for dealing with them and breaking free from patterns that cause pain through resistance.

I recommend this book to those seeking practical ways to heal their relationship with life, as it demonstrates that such healing is indeed possible.

great again again

Most helpful and so helpful, I am starting from the beginning again now. i work with dance, somatic, movement and healing. this book is a must!!

Great book

Life changing stuff it is a long book but i felt joy upon finishing and a sense of accomplishment