Thursday, July 6, 2023

The Beauty of Feelings

Whether you’re a thinking- or feelings-oriented person doesn’t matter. The key in life and at work is seeking balance between both

Guide Magazine

By Jon Heinen, Representative

A favourite saying of mine is people won’t likely remember what you say, but they will remember how you made them feel.

Feelings. When I teach CLAC’s steward training classes, I joke with the participants that we all have feelings, even adults.

I am a feelings-oriented person, and I think feelings get a bad rap. The beautiful part of feelings is that they are the joy, happiness, connection, love, and more of what we feel in good times with people. But feelings are also difficult, intense, uncontrollable (at times), irrational, angry, sad, and more.

In the saying quoted above, there is a subtle reference to the difference between thoughts and feelings. I’m trained as a Myers-Briggs Type Indicator practitioner, and one of the tools in that system to identify preferences around decision making relates to F (feelings) and T (thinking).

Everyone has feelings and everyone does thinking, but we are oriented to prefer one or the other. The challenge is in managing the outer extremes of these personality traits.

An extreme thinking person can be lured into abstract, rational, disconnected thought. Their decisions are made solely on logic, reason, and what makes sense, with little feeling for the impact on people.

An extreme feelings person can be pulled into irrational actions, intense emotion, and overdramatic reactions. They can be paralyzed into inaction by the impact of their decisions on people.

The economic system we live and work in largely prefers a thinking orientation. Big business relies on thinking, reason, and logic to make money and set up systems. Managers are often the smart, thinking, analytical types who are comfortable detaching from the broader impacts of their decisions on people, focusing instead on organizational success.

In many ways, I admire these people and this system—it’s clean, clear, and makes sense. But sometimes this thinking orientation makes it hard to fit in as a feelings-oriented person. We are often perceived in the extreme examples described above—irrational, intense, overdramatic.

Sometimes, this is true. But we are also the heart, the connection, the gentleness, and the compassion that business needs to embrace to balance their detached, logical, and rational decision making.

My struggle is to balance my feelings orientation with logic and reason. My daily exercise is to train my brain to be smart, to remember more, to come across as rational and intelligent. It’s the way the world works.

But I also need to nurture my feelings so that I don’t become extreme and give the impression of irrationality or wildness. It’s a lot of work sometimes!

I know of one particular company whose employees I represent that attempts to develop the same balance. Its management is highly structured and rational and good at setting up systems for success in the “thinking” space.

But what I enjoy about working with them is that they remember their “feeling” space too. They care about their employees. Resolutions to disputes take into account the impact on employees’ feelings and the effect on workplace morale but in a way that is also in balance with organizational success. The business may prefer the thinking space, but they allow themselves into the feeling space.

I prefer the feeling space, so I have to remember to approach this company’s management with a thinking mentality. It doesn’t always work, but it’s amazing to experience the attempt at balance.

How do you naturally orient to the world? Are you a feelings- or thinking-oriented person? Do you have coworkers who are out of balance that you struggle with? Is your employer balanced or are they overly feelings or thinking oriented?

Being aware of the need for balance between thinking and feeling has helped me remember that both are important. Good thinking matters, feelings matter, and striving to balance them is a lifetime exercise.

The Beauty of Feelings

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