Thinking and feeling are obviously very connected but which comes first?
Feelings signal problems, unmet needs or demands that require the mind to engage and respond. Feelings alert us that something unexpected or unresolved has occurred or will occur soon. The signal puts us into a position where we're demanded to start thinking about, then deal with this alert.
This is the healthy sequence. One we want to get better and better at. The feeling comes, our mind notices the feeling and begins to think about it. Our thinking is designed to find the solution that meets the need underlying the feeling. We choose an action as a solution to the feeling. The solution the mind settles on is where we often go wrong. Because our solutions to feelings are learned, not innate.
When we have learned to bury a feeling, for example, thoughts to bring up feelings. Because we've not learned the proper way to meet the need. This is a reversal of the system. It's a reactivation of unresolved psychological needs. We need to learn real solutions to emotional signals.
Said another way, all thoughts are an internalization of our perceptions of the world. If we have learned ways to respond to our emotional signals that satisfy them, our thoughts become the path to "feeling our way to our needs". We work out what to do in response to our feelings.
If we haven't learned how to satisfy our needs, our thoughts then become complicated mental gymnastics routines to avoid the feelings we don't know how to take action on. These are commonly called complexes or defenses. And we've all got them. What once was an adaptive response to unmet needs becomes maldaptive to the life we hope for.
Improving this system of feeling, becoming thinking, becoming action is a very practical way that psychotherapy can benefit us.
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