MSI Press Blog

  Somewhere between kindergarten and adulthood, many of us learn that emotions are like elbows at the dinner table: best kept tucked in. We’re taught to smile politely, cry discreetly, and never—under any circumstances—rage in public unless we’re winning an Oscar. But emotional expression isn’t just personal. It’s cultural. It’s generational. It’s shaped by everything from family lore to workplace norms to the unspoken rules of grocery store etiquette. Society doesn’t just influence how we feel—it influences whether we’re allowed to show it. 🎭 The Performance of Composure In many Western cultures, emotional restraint is equated with maturity. We admire the “strong silent type,” reward stoicism in crisis, and label vulnerability as weakness. Crying at work? Unprofessional. Expressing anger? Unhinged. Admitting fear? Better keep that to your therapist. But this performance of composure often comes at a cost. We suppress grief until it leaks out sideways. We mask anxiety with pr...

  Let’s begin with a confession: I used to think emotions were like weather—unpredictable, inconvenient, and best endured quietly until they passed. I preferred the sturdiness of logic, the clarity of action, the safety of detachment. But somewhere between caregiving crises, spiritual retreats, and late-night porch conversations with my multigenerational household, I began to suspect that emotions weren’t interruptions to growth—they were the curriculum. Emotions as Teachers, Not Tourists We often treat emotions like uninvited guests. Anger? Slam the door. Grief? Hide the good china. Joy? Let it in, but only if it promises not to rearrange the furniture. But what if emotions aren’t visitors at all? What if they’re residents—part of the architecture of our inner lives? Personal growth isn’t a tidy staircase. It’s more like a spiral—revisiting old wounds with new wisdom, circling back to joy with deeper reverence. Emotions guide that spiral. They point to what matters, what hurts...

  Unconditional love is often spoken of in soft tones and poetic phrases—as if it’s something simple, automatic, even easy. But if you’ve ever tried to love fully and freely, without expectation or self-protection, you know: it takes work. Real work. Inner work. The essence of unconditional love isn’t found in a single act of kindness. It’s revealed in our willingness to look within—to understand why we react the way we do, where our emotional triggers lie, and what parts of our past still shape the way we love in the present. That’s where  Learning to Feel  begins. This book is not about suppressing emotions or floating above them. It’s about entering the heart of them—discovering what is ours, what is borrowed, and what no longer serves us. As we do that, we gain something extraordinary: the power to choose how we feel and how we respond. And when we gain that choice, love changes. It becomes less about control, more about connection. Less about fear, more about freedom...