The Energy of Emotions

Empowering Chats with Susan Burrell

Ep#241 - The Energy of Emotions, An Interview with Empathy Expert and Author, Karla McLaren

My guest today for this episode of Empowering Chats is Author and Empathy Expert, Karla McLaren.

Her latest book, which is actually a revised and updated version is chock full of wisdom and definition. It’s called The Language of Emotions. What Your Feelings Are Trying to Tell You.

When I got the book, I opened it up randomly and the chapter on the "nger Family" is what appeared for me. I was obviously supposed to read this chapter. It described my family and my issues to a “T.” I found myself writing in the margins and starring what applied to me and/or my family.

So, I asked Karla why the language of emotions? Why that title? She shared that the original title was "Emotional Genius" – but it felt like that title was too much and something that people would not relate to – so she and her editor kicked around other ideas for the title and came up with "The Language of Emotions." Karla goes on to explain that many people don’t have a language for their emotions, they just know if it feels good or bad. And if you don’t have a language for things then you don’t understand it.

Emotions hold a tremendous amount of energy and we’ve all seen what happens when we repress or carelessly express them. I know I saw it played out all the time through anger in my family.

This is a big book for a reason. Karla explains that there is no other book like it. There is no other book that dives deep into emotions and explains in detail how to talk about them. Karla even has a whole section dedicated to practices for working with feelings and building your empathy skills.

Karla also offers an Empathy Academy. The courses offered, teach about one emotion or several emotions and how to incorporate words and language to identify what you are feeling.

Karla shared the following as we came to the end of our interview. She said that our emotions are here to help us. She compared them to our rescue team, much like when EMTs or Firetrucks are called to a fire, our emotions come to our rescue when times are tough. They are the “firetrucks” of the soul, they are here to help us address our emotions.

I love that!

To learn more about Karla and the work she does please visit: KarlaMclaren.com

To sign up for her Empathy Academy visit: KarlaMclaren.com/my-events

To order her book or see her other books / products visit: KarlaMclaren.com/bookshop/

To learn more about how I show up in the world please visit: SusanBurrell.com