Love heals, while lack of love, judgment, childish expectations and irrational thinking can undermine my happiness here and now. Happiness grows from love and from a loving mind. If I do not learn to love myself and nurture my willingness to create my own happiness, no one can do it for me. Happiness is personal and internal; it is shaped by my perceptions of myself, the world and others.

The Role of Emotions

The human body has a remarkable guidance system: our emotions. We come into the world with this emotional system. Our emotions can act like warning signals, helping us notice whether what we are thinking is supporting us or harming us. Anger, impatience, complaining, disappointment, and judgment of ourselves or others can reveal our perceptions and beliefs.

For example, if I expect all drivers to be good and respectful, I may become very upset when someone cuts me off and believe that the other person is responsible for my discomfort. If I do not understand the role of my emotions, I may blame the trigger instead of looking at what is happening within me. My discomfort may be showing me the belief that other people should always behave the way I think they should.

That is where I can begin to ask myself two important questions: What am I telling myself right now? and What do I need? Sometimes a need calls for a concrete action. At other times, my discomfort is inviting me to question a belief, expectation, fear or judgment that is creating unnecessary suffering.

Emotional Dependency

When we speak about affective autonomy, we also have to speak about emotional dependency. We live in a fairly materialistic society where we may believe we are free because we can have what we want and do many things we enjoy: hobbies, sports, travel, education, careers and more. But this kind of happiness is temporary and conditional. If I lose my job, my health, my ability to practise a sport or to travel, I may also feel that I have lost my happiness.

I am happy when the outside world meets my expectations and desires. Otherwise, I become upset and may experience life as something I have to endure instead of trying to understand what is happening within me. This is what we call emotional dependency: placing my happiness in the hands of something or someone outside myself. I wait for people or circumstances over which I often have little or no control.

I’ll Be Happy When I Have… If I Do…

Emotional dependency can mean waiting for what I do, what I have or how I appear before finally allowing myself to love myself and feel good. Over time, this can leave us increasingly tired, disappointed, anxious, stressed or discouraged.

Think about it: if a prestigious career, a beautiful home, many possessions, being a millionaire or a world-famous star — or simply doing everything we enjoy — truly had the power to make us happy, we should already be happy. Right?

I Want to Love Myself Unconditionally

In childhood, many of us did not learn how to take care of our inner needs. We often learned instead to prove our worth through what we did, what we had and how we appeared. In other words, our society can teach us that a person’s value comes from accomplishments, possessions or physical appearance.

We may then love ourselves only when our external reality matches our expectations: the perfect job, a partner who listens to me, doing what I want when I want, friends who are always respectful, and so on. Yet self-love does not come from objects or from other people. Otherwise, considering how much we already own and how much we already do, we should all be swimming in happiness by now.

When unconditional self-love has not been learned in childhood, we may develop survival strategies aimed at pleasing others, gaining recognition, avoiding disappointment or preventing conflict. We can remain dependent on the way we imagine others see us, through what we do, what we have and how we appear.

Affective autonomy invites us to learn something different: to observe what is happening between our two ears, to recognize the beliefs that shape our feelings, to identify our needs and to gradually develop a more loving relationship with ourselves.

To Go Further

Learning to observe what is happening between my two ears, question the beliefs that contribute to my inner discomfort, identify my needs and develop a more loving relationship with myself is part of the path toward greater affective autonomy.

I offer helping-relationship sessions using an Affective Autonomy approach, online or in Longueuil, Quebec.

For information about my trainings and workshops for community organizations, please email me at vivrelebonheur@videotron.ca.

You can also explore Vivre le bonheur to learn more about my approach, services and other articles on affective autonomy.

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Renée Marc-Aurèle
Helping-Relationship Therapist — Affective Autonomy
RITMA Member — MARA Certified
Vivre le bonheur
vivrelebonheur@videotron.ca