I was/am an Emotional Externalizer, but with God’s grace, the bible, prayer, counseling, 12-steps, deep relationships, and more, making forward progress to becoming an Emotional Internalizer, only complete in Heaven.

Have you ever interacted with someone who regularly projects themselves as the victim, is easily offended, and is passive-aggressive? That was me and even today when I am tired, I can fall back into these types of behaviors. Dr. Weiss explains this type of person is an “emotional externalizer.” Dr. Weiss provides eleven characteristics of an “emotional externalizer” in a podcast. I identified the most with these four characteristics.

Number four: being the victim, Number six: they’re very easily offended, Number ten: They’re prone to medicate, Number eleven: Passive aggressiveness
Love and Sex Today with Dr. Doug Weiss, Emotional Externalizer Podcast

I am working on taking ownership of my emotions, growing emotionally, seeing everyone as equal, and empowering others. These are four characteristics of an “emotional internalizer” as Dr. Weiss states in his podcast which can be read or listened to from the link below.

Number one: They’re responsible for their emotions, Number four: They tend to grow emotionally, Number eight: They see with equality, Number eleven: They are empowering.
Love and Sex Today with Dr. Doug Weiss, Emotional Internalizer Podcast

As I mentioned, I have a history of being an “emotional externalizer.” Thankfully, God now has me in a place where I increasingly have self-awareness of when my emotions are external. God’s grace, reading the bible (verses like Romans 12:1-2 below), prayer, individual counseling, a 12-steps recovery group, and practicing being emotionally vulnerable continue to help me make progress in increasingly be an “emotional internalizer.” I have a goal to own my emotions and to be more assertive, also characteristics of an “emotional internalizer.” I am very thankful.

A Living Sacrifice 12 I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. ²Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.
Romans 12:1-2 English Standard Version

Place Your Life Before God 12 ^1-2So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.
Romans 12:10-2 The Message

About GettingCloserToOurGod

This blog is written by Todd Christenson. He was raised in Nebraska and currently lives on Long Island in New York. Though out my childhood, my family attended church. We prayed together at meals. I thought I was prepared for life. After college, I moved to New York City. Shy, unsure of myself, building an identity in worldly things, increasingly prideful, self-righteousness, a controlling nature. In 2013, God spoke through someone, suggesting I confess my sins. I did. I realized that every day, I’d been glorifying myself, not God. Today, God’s teaching me to have my identity in Him, only, my dependency in Him, not myself, being who He wants me to be, not the world, loving Him first, loving others as myself.

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