Dr. James Dobson - Emotions- Can You Trust Them?: The Best-Selling Guide to Understanding and Managing Your Feelings of Anger, Guilt, Self-Awareness and Love

1975 by Gospel Light Publications

Published by Revell

a division of Baker Publishing Group

PO Box 6287, Grand Rapids, MI 49516-6287

www.revellbooks.com

Previously published by Regal Books in 2014

Originally published uder the following titles: Dr. James Dobson Talks About Guilt; Dr. James Dobson Talks About Love; Dr. James Dobson Talks About Anger; Dr. James Dobson Talks About Gods Will.

Ebook edition created 2014

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meansfor example, electronic, photocopy, recordingwithout the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.

ISBN 978-1-4412-2481-1

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.

All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version. NIV. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica, Inc. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com

Scripture quotations labeled KJV are from the King James Version of the Bible.

Scripture quotations labeled NEB are from The New English Bible. Copyright 1961, 1970, 1989 by The Delegates of Oxford University Press and The Syndics of the Cambridge University Press. Reprinted by permission.

Scripture quotations labeled PHILLIPS are from The New Testament in Modern English, revised editionJ. B. Phillips, translator. J. B. Phillips 1958, 1960, 1972. Used by permission of Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc.

Scripture quotations labeled RSV are from the Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright 1952 [2nd edition, 1971] by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations labeled TEV are from the Todays English Version. Copyright American Bible Society 1966, 1971, 1976. Used by permission.

Scripture quotations labeled TLB are from The Living Bible, copyright 1971. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

Contents

Introduction

Emotions in the Christian Life

Youre about to read a book about human emotion and its impact on our daily lives. That topic always reminds me of a story my mother told about the high school she attended in 1930. It was located in a small Oklahoma town which had produced a series of terrible football teams. They usually lost the important games and were invariably clobbered by their arch rivals from a nearby community. Understandably, the students and their parents began to get depressed and dispirited by the drubbing their troops were given every Friday night. It must have been awful.

Finally, a wealthy oil producer decided to take matters in his own hands. He asked to speak to the team in the locker room after yet another devastating defeat. What followed was one of the most dramatic football speeches of all times. This businessman proceeded to offer a brand new Ford to every boy on the team and to each coach if they would simply defeat their bitter rivals in the next game. Knute Rockne couldnt have said it better.

The team went crazy with sheer delight. They howled and cheered and slapped each other on their padded behinds. For seven days, the boys ate, drank and breathed football. At night they dreamed about touchdowns and rumbleseats. The entire school caught the spirit of ecstasy, and a holiday fever pervaded the campus. Each player could visualize himself behind the wheel of a gorgeous coupe, with eight gorgeous girls hanging all over his gorgeous body.

Finally, the big night arrived and the team assembled in the locker room. Excitement was at an unprecedented high. The coach made several inane comments and the boys hurried out to face the enemy. They assembled on the sidelines, put their hands together and shouted a simultaneous Rah! Then they ran onto the field and were demolished, 38 to zero.

The teams exuberance did not translate into a single point on the scoreboard. Seven days of hoorah and whoop-de-do simply couldnt compensate for the players lack of discipline and conditioning and practice and study and coaching and drill and experience and character. Such is the nature of emotion. It has a definite place in human affairs, but when forced to stand alone, feelings usually reveal themselves to be unreliable and ephemeral and even a bit foolish.

On the other hand, it would be a mistake to minimize the impact of emotion on human behavior. I recently described this influence in my book, Straight Talk to Men and Their Wives , and have obtained permission to quote a section of that discussion as follows:

Have you ever stood outdoors near the end of a day and heard the whining sound of a mosquito flying past your ear?

Ill bet Im about to get punctured, you think.

Just then, you feel the creature light on your forearm and you immediately glance downward. But to your surprise, the insect is not there. You merely imagined that you had been invaded.

Or in another context, have you ever awakened after a frightening dream, lying breathless in your bed? You listened to the sounds of the night, wondering if the dream was based on reality. Then suddenly, just as you expected, there was a bump coming from the dark side of the house. An hour later you concluded that no one was actually there.

Emotions are powerful forces within the human mind. Fear, especially, has a remarkable way of generating evidence to support itself. Physicians in clinical practice spend a large portion of their time convincing people that their self-diagnoses are not accurate... that their symptoms are imaginary or psychosomatic.

Even the young and the brave experience such deception. My good friend, Steve Smith, won a bronze star for courage in Vietnam combat. However, the first night his unit arrived in the war torn country was not to be remembered for remarkable valor. His company had never seen actual combat, and the men were terrified. They dug foxholes on a hill and nervously watched the sun disappear beyond the horizon. At approximately midnight, the enemy attacked as anticipated. Guns began to blaze on one side of the mountain, and before long, all the soldiers were firing frantically and throwing hand grenades into the darkness. The battle raged throughout the night and the infantry appeared to be winning. Finally, the long awaited sun came up and the body count began. But not one single dead Viet Cong lay at the perimeter of the mountain. In fact, not one enemy soldier had even participated in the attack. The company of green troops had fought the night in mortal combat... and won!

Permit me one further example of emotions that overruled reason. The city of Los Angeles was paralyzed with fear in 1969, when Charles Manson and his family murdered Sharon Tate and her friends, and then butchered Leno and Rosemary La Bianca in cold blood. Residents wondered who would be next? My mother was quite convinced that she was the prime candidate. Sure enough, Mom and Dad heard the intruder as they lay in bed one night. Thump! went the sound from the area of the kitchen.

Did you hear that? asked my mother.

Yes, be quiet, said my father.

They lay staring at the darkened ceiling, breathing shallowly and listening for further clues. A second thump brought them to their feet. They felt their way to the bedroom door which was closed. At this point, we are shown a vast difference between how my mother and my father faced a crisis. Her inclination was to hold the door shut to keep the intruder from entering the bedroom. Thus, she propped her foot against the bottom of the door and threw her weight against the upper section. My fathers approach was to confront the attacker head on. He reached through the darkness and grasped the doorknob, but his pull met the resistance from my mother.