Understanding Our Emotions and Feelings
by Kerin Acosta, FLM Psychologist
At Family Life Missions, part of our daily routine is to identify and express feelings properly. At one time this was hard work for the children living at the Por Los Niños Village. Because of the trauma they had experienced, they had lost their voice and they didn't know how to express what they were feeling. Some tools, such as the feelings chart, has helped. The children learn how to express their feelings and can identify more than three feelings when there is a change in their life. This gives us a lot of satisfaction knowing that they have achieved emotional health. Research shows that not expressing emotions and feelings hurts our body and can causes heart disease, ulcers, or gastrointestinal problems, as well as experiencing high levels of cortisol (the hormone that is produced by stress), causing tension in the neck muscles and experiencing headaches or muscle aches.
In our culture, not expressing negative feelings is seen as being a strong, resilient person. Of course, that is a mistaken belief. Through trainings, counseling, and psychological therapies we teach children and families the importance of properly expressing emotions and feelings to have healthy, holistic families in the community of Catacamas.
At Family Life Missions, we see the hope of Christ. FLM is transforming lives in Catacamas through the Family Preservation program with parenting workshops, nutrition resources, “building dreams,” and spiritual guidance. FLM is growing with safe and secure homes for children through the Foster Care program, where vulnerable and abandoned children are placed in loving homes that change their future path. FLM is equipping adolescents each day through the Por Los Niños program that provides education and residential homes. The Por Los Niños village provides loving homes for vulnerable children on campus. It equips students from the community through the Escuela Bilingüe Por Los Niños (Por Los Niños Bilingual School) with a quality Christian education. I believe that FLM is working closely alongside God and follows in step with Christ’s demonstration of love. When I think of this love, I am reminded of Romans 5:6-11...
By Eduard Juarez, FLM Honduras Accounting Administrator
Family is very important to God; in fact, the idea came from Him. God could have created us to live in isolation, but He didn't! We need each other not only for the procreation of the human being but also to support, build, and bless the place where God has placed us. When writing this, the scripture Psalms 68:6 NKJV (our mission) comes to mind: “God sets the solitary in families.” Knowing that many children have had to be separated from their families by different circumstances, we all have the call to take action to return to the original model of God.