Why Do We Need Feelings, Why Talk About Them, and Why Express Them?

Here are the short answers to the questions “Why do we need feelings, why talk about them, and why express them?”:

1. For survival.
2. To truly live your own life, in line with your individuality—as opposed to “life passing you by,” “living someone else’s life,” or “why live at all?”
3. To create, maintain, and develop relationships with others, which in turn is necessary for survival, living your own life, and improving its quality.

Let’s take a closer look at these three levels.

Survival Level

1. Why do we need feelings?

This has been written about a lot, so here’s a brief summary. Feelings give us guidance on what to do and what to avoid. Disgusted? Don’t eat it—it might be toxic. Scared? There’s danger—don’t go there, don’t do that, run away (it’s important to distinguish between natural fear, which helps survival, and neurotic fear, which is baseless and hinders survival). Angry? Defend your boundaries, overcome obstacles. Happy? Do it again. Sad? Something important to you is lost; you need to accept the loss. Guilty? Figure out if it’s real guilt from doing something you truly don’t want to repeat, or neurotic guilt where someone is trying to manipulate you. Feel attracted to someone? Take a closer look—maybe it’s worth building a relationship (friendship, partnership, romance, etc.). And so on.

2. Why experience feelings?

Experiencing feelings helps maintain health and, as a result, life itself. Suppressing, denying, ignoring, or blocking feelings can lead to psychosomatic illnesses, premature death, and unpleasant life situations. For example, if someone denies and doesn’t experience their own aggression, they may unconsciously provoke situations where aggression is directed at them from others.

3. Why express feelings?

Expressing feelings also helps maintain health. Every feeling has a natural physical, facial, and vocal reaction, which includes universal human elements as well as cultural, family, and individual ones. When someone suppresses these natural reactions, their body develops tension that blocks blood flow, energy, etc., leading to illness. So, expressing feelings physically—following your natural reaction—is important even if no one is around. This doesn’t mean destructive actions (for example, with aggression, it’s important to combine natural impulses with learning to express them in a healthy way in society). Expressing feelings also has a significant social component, which will be discussed further in the “relationships” section.

4. Why talk about feelings?

Verbalizing and talking about feelings, even if no one is around, is part of experiencing and expressing them, which is necessary for health. Sharing your feelings with someone who can empathize and support you makes the experience even deeper and more complete. Joy becomes brighter, and grief, on the contrary, fades. That covers survival. Relationships will be discussed below.

The Level of Living Your Life

Experiencing feelings in itself gives a sense of being alive. People who, for whatever reason, stop feeling, often end up thinking, “I feel like I’m not really living,” and wonder, “Why live at all?” It’s like the joke: “The balloons are colorful and pretty, but they don’t make me happy.” Everything seems fine, but life doesn’t bring joy, and its purpose becomes unclear.

Feelings also serve as a guide: Who am I? Where am I? What’s important to me? Who is important to me? They help you see and feel your own path and follow it—to live your own life, not someone else’s. Does what I do make me happy or depressed? Am I interested or bored? If I’m happy and interested, I should go in that direction. If not, I should look for what does bring me joy and interest. Is this important to me? If not, why am I doing it?

The Level of Creating, Maintaining, and Developing Relationships

Relationships with people are essential for survival—in isolation, a person cannot survive physically or mentally. Relationships are also necessary for growth and self-realization, which can only fully happen in the world, with other people, not in isolation. In the end, relationships are necessary for living your own life and following your own path.

By definition, a feeling is an attitude toward something or someone. Relationships with people are built on feelings—on your attitude toward them. How do I feel about this person? Do I like them? Are they important to me? If I don’t like someone and they’re not important to me, will I want to build a relationship with them? For example, do you want to build and develop relationships with coworkers you don’t like? Probably not. And if I don’t feel anything and don’t care about anyone? Then I won’t want to build relationships with anyone, making it hard to survive, grow, and realize myself.

When I feel something for someone, I develop an attitude toward them—this is the “seed” of a relationship. When I express and voice my feelings to them, I’m inviting them to build a relationship with me. If they have reciprocal feelings and express and voice them, we create a relationship.

If I don’t feel, I won’t want to build relationships. If I feel but don’t express or voice it, I can’t invite someone to build a relationship or interest them. If I feel, express, and voice it, but the other person doesn’t feel, express, or voice anything in return, there won’t be mutuality.

If expressing feelings isn’t blocked, people automatically pick up on someone’s state (at least unconsciously), since expression has a universal component (if expression is blocked, people with high empathy can still sense the feelings). Voicing feelings allows for conscious contact and dialogue, making it possible to agree on how to interact. It’s important that what’s expressed and what’s voiced are congruent.

Imagine your reaction in these slightly different situations. Someone approaches you:

1. With a smile and says, “I like you, let’s be friends.”
2. With a completely neutral face and says, “I like you, let’s be friends.”
3. With a frown and says, “I like you, let’s be friends.”
4. With a smile but says nothing.
5. With a neutral face and says, “Let’s be friends” (without saying “I like you”).

In which situation would you feel the impulse to start a friendship?

This is how feelings, their expression, and voicing help create relationships between people. But relationships also need to be maintained, and here too, feelings and their expression help.

In this context, feelings can be divided into three categories:

• Feelings toward a person;
• Feelings related to a person’s behavior or actions;
• Feelings not related to the person or their actions, but your own “personal” feelings about your own processes.

Expressing and voicing feelings toward a person lets them know: “I see you, you matter to me, you’re important to me, I still feel something for you, and we’re still in a relationship, I consider you in my life.”

When someone expresses feelings toward you, you get the message that you exist for them, while indifference sends the message, “You don’t exist for me.” Expressing and voicing positive feelings to a loved one is necessary to maintain a relationship.

Additionally, expressing and voicing feelings helps make contact clear, deep, and intimate, as well as mutually comfortable. In clear, transparent contact, everyone understands what’s happening, why it’s happening, and how to deal with it. This gives a sense of stability and comfort.

Compare these situations:

1. “The husband comes home and is silent. He’s upset about something at work, and it’s better to leave him alone for now; he’ll talk about it later.” Or, “The husband comes home and is silent. What’s wrong? Maybe he’s mad at me? Maybe he’s seeing someone else? What should I do? I’ll keep pestering him until he tells me everything.”
2. “The wife is angry because she came home tired from work and saw a pile of dirty dishes her husband left after lunch. She wishes he’d wash his own dishes. Then she’d be happy.” Or, “The wife is silent. She’s been silent for three days. Then she yells that her husband should have figured it out himself. Then she leaves for her mother’s.”
3. “The husband silently accepts his wife’s gift with a neutral face and leaves. Maybe he didn’t like it?” Or, “The husband happily accepts the gift and says he appreciates it.”/”The husband accepts the gift with a mix of happiness and embarrassment, saying he appreciates the gesture, but the gift itself isn’t right for him, and he’d like to choose his own next time.”

Sharing your feelings makes what loved ones unconsciously sense explicit and conscious. Explaining the reason and describing the desired actions also brings clarity. When loved ones sense your state but don’t know what caused it or what to do, they start imagining reasons and possible actions—and these fantasies are usually negative and don’t match reality.

Moreover, when you share your feelings with a loved one, it creates intimacy and depth in the relationship, helping it grow. By opening up about your feelings, you open yourself up. Openness allows you to find common ground and get to know each other more deeply.

In Summary

1. Expressing and voicing feelings toward a person allows you to create and maintain relationships. If the feelings are unpleasant, it can help you avoid starting or help you end relationships when necessary.
2. Expressing and voicing feelings related to a person’s behavior makes contact clearer and more comfortable—you can discuss the situation and find a way to interact that brings more mutual positive feelings and fewer negative ones.
3. Expressing and voicing feelings related to your own personal processes also brings clarity and comfort to the relationship, increases closeness and depth, and helps it develop on a deeper, more meaningful level rather than just a superficial one.