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Emotions as Messages
When we don't understand our emotional messages, we enter an emotional mystery tour, a loop of confusion and even distress in which emotions intensify because their messages aren't being effectively received, translated and responded to. We feel stress, for example, not only from challenges themselves but also from our inability to make sense of them, and over time, this can affect, among other things, our well-being and outlook.
Laurence's story showed what happens when someone starts looking in the right place. His stress was a tailored message, not a mystery, about being unprepared and fearing the repetition of his father's mistakes. Once he understood that, his emotions began guiding him toward clarity and action.
insightsThat’s what emotions are designed to do. They are messages, forms of communication from within, sent to help you thrive and survive well. When you treat emotions as messages, you begin to see them as allies rather than adversaries.
To make the most of these messages, it helps to understand who’s sending them: your Emotional Self. This part of you is constantly observing, evaluating, and communicating through emotion. Whether you experience joy, anger, sadness, or calm, your Emotional Self is trying to tell you something important about you and your retired life, whether you are in the planning, transitioning or living phases.
A receiver, by accepting and noticing what you feel.
A translator, by asking, "What is this emotion trying to tell me?"
A responder, by acting in ways that keep or get you back on track.
The cause: what triggered the emotion, often rooted in key areas of life such as identity, relationships, health, or purpose.
The response: what your Emotional Self wants you to do about it.
Difficult emotions, therefore, are messages that something isn't working and needs to be addressed. Positive emotions confirm that you're on track and should continue. Both types serve the same purpose: to guide you toward thriving and surviving more effectively.
Your Emotional Self takes its role seriously. When ignored, it doesn't go away with an indifferent shrug of the shoulders but will escalate from low-level unease to more intense states such as stress, panic, or depression until its message is heard. Such emotions might feel like punishments, but that would be to miss the point. Your Emotional Self is determined to get you into dialogue because your well-being depends on it, even if it means delivering really helpful messages in really unhelpful ways.
The trouble is that your Emotional Self isn't the most effective communicator. They can't call, text, email, or direct message you. All they have at their disposal is an array of emotions, which they use with varying degrees of intensity depending on whether their message is getting through. Your Emotional Self relies on you knowing they exist and understanding that their purpose is to support your thriving and surviving in retirement.
To repeat: they need you to be a great receiver, translator, and responder to their emotional messages, and until you are, you're in trouble. That's why I designed my IMPACT Model and this course.
Ultimately, the goal is to develop a cooperative relationship with your Emotional Self, listening, interpreting, and responding with curiosity and intent rather than avoidance. When you do, they become your greatest ally in retirement.
So far in this stage, you've explored what Meaning really involves: the ability to make sense of why things are as they are. You've learned that emotions are messages to understand, and that your Emotional Self is the part of you sending those messages, guiding you toward thriving and surviving well. Laurence's story illustrated this in action: how emotions like stress, when understood rather than resisted, can lead directly to insight and transformation.
Now it's your turn to apply these ideas. In the following activity, you'll practise recognising, translating, and responding to your own emotional messages, just as Laurence did, to uncover what they might be telling you about your current experience of retirement.
Think of a recent emotion related to your retirement, such as stress, frustration, or excitement. Name it clearly.
Laurence began by recognising his overwhelming stress and agitation. His feelings were not meaningless but signs of something deeper that needed attention.
Ask yourself:
Laurence realised the cause of his stress wasn't work or health but fear of repeating his father's unhappy retirement. The response his emotion was asking for was planning and preparation, the very skills that had kept him calm at work.
Turn your emotion into a clear statement of meaning. For example:
Laurence might have said, "My stress is reminding me that I'm unprepared and that planning will help me feel in control."
Your Previous Answers:
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What practical actions could help you respond to what this emotion is communicating?
Laurence acted on his emotional message by contacting me and developing a clear retirement plan, turning stress into action through practical steps such as researching property abroad and growing his business.
After acting, revisit the feeling. Has its message changed? What does that tell you about what you've learned?
Once Laurence acted on his message, his stress shifted to excitement - a thumbs up from his Emotional Self.
Your Previous Answers:
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When you become an effective receiver, translator, and responder, every feeling, however uncomfortable, becomes part of your progress and understanding. As Laurence discovered, meaning emerges the moment you stop ignoring your emotions and start listening to what they are trying to tell you.
Every emotion is trying to help you. Behind each one is your Emotional Self, the part of you that has your best interests at heart in retirement and who notices when something needs attention, whether that is to change it or maintain it.
When you receive, translate and respond, emotions become messages rather than noise, and your Emotional Self becomes an ally rather than a critic.
Together, they guide you toward thriving and surviving well in retirement.
You've explored how your emotions act as messages from your Emotional Self. Now, use what you've learned so far to shape goals that respond to those messages with clarity and intention.
Write one or two short goals that reflect what your emotions are asking of you. These don't need to be grand or final; they simply need to be the next steps in turning emotional understanding into meaningful progress.
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