---
title: "▍Permission to Feel: the Power of Emotional Intelligence to Achieve Well-Being and Success"
created: 2025-10-20T08:22:47
modified: 2025-10-22T22:53:39
author: Marc Brackett
draft: false
category: Book
url: https://www.amazon.com/Permission-Feel-Emotional-Intelligence-Well-Being/dp/1250212839
---

> “Most of us are unaware of how important vocabulary is to emotion skills. As we’ve seen, using many different words implies valuable distinctions—that we’re not always simply angry but are sometimes annoyed, irritated, frustrated, disgusted, aggravated, and so on. If we can’t discern the difference, it suggests that we can’t understand it either. It’s the difference between a rich emotional life and an impoverished one. Your child will inherit the one you provide.” ― Marc Brackett, [Permission to Feel: The Power of Emotional Intelligence to Achieve Well-Being and Success](https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/68114068)

> “Emotion regulation is not about not feeling. Neither is it exerting tight control over what we feel. And it’s not about banishing negative emotions and feeling only positive ones. Rather, <mark>emotion regulation starts with giving ourselves and others the permission to own our feelings—all of them.</mark>” ― Marc Brackett, [Permission to Feel: The Power of Emotional Intelligence to Achieve Well-Being and Success](https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/68114068)

> “The irony, though, is that when we ignore our feelings, or suppress them, they only become stronger. The really powerful emotions build up inside us, like a dark force that inevitably poisons everything we do, whether we like it or not. Hurt feelings don’t vanish on their own. They don’t heal themselves. If we don’t express our emotions, they pile up like a debt that will eventually come due.” ― Marc Brackett, [Permission to Feel: The Power of Emotional Intelligence to Achieve Well-Being and Success](https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/68114068)

> “The core skill of Understanding is the search for the underlying theme or possible cause that fuels the emotion. We’re not asking questions and listening to answers just to provide a sympathetic ear. <mark>As we listen, we’re looking for a meaning that goes deeper than the words being said.</mark>” ― Marc Brackett, [Permission to Feel: The Power of Emotional Intelligence to Achieve Well-Being and Success](https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/68114068)

> “Labeling emotions accurately increases self-awareness and helps us to communicate emotions effectively, reducing misunderstanding in social interactions.” ― Marc Brackett, [Permission to Feel: The Power of Emotional Intelligence to Achieve Well-Being and Success](https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/68114068)

> “Wordlessly, babies get their messages across loud and clear, as any parent can attest. Infant emotions are focused on the basics of survival—the need for food, sleep, physical comfort, and security. <mark>This underscores the primary purpose of emotional expression: it keeps us alive. From a Darwinian perspective, demanding attention to our feelings is a necessity, not a choice.</mark>” ― Marc Brackett, [Permission to Feel: The Power of Emotional Intelligence to Achieve Well-Being and Success](https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/68114068)

> “When we’re acting as an emotion scientist with someone else, we can ask the other person: What might have happened to cause this feeling? What usually makes you feel this way? What’s going on that you’re feeling this way? What were you doing just before you started feeling this way? Who were you with? What do you need right now? What can I do to support you? As a teaching exercise, we’ll sometimes have children read a story, then ask them: What does this character feel? Why does he or she feel that way? What do you think might have caused this character to feel this way? What about what happened to the character helps you to understand his or her feelings? If the same thing happened to you, what do you think you would feel?” ― Marc Brackett, [Permission to Feel: The Power of Emotional Intelligence to Achieve Well-Being and Success](https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/68114068)

> “These are some of the questions we can ask when we’re trying to understand our own feelings: What just happened? What was I doing before this happened? What might have caused my feelings or reaction? What happened this morning, or last night, that might be involved in this? What has happened before with this person that might be connected? (In the event that your emotion has to do with a relationship.) What memories do I have about this situation or place?” ― Marc Brackett, [Permission to Feel: The Power of Emotional Intelligence to Achieve Well-Being and Success](https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/68114068)

> “Are we actually getting worse at reading one another’s emotions? There’s evidence that says we are. The more time we spend communicating through electronic screens, the less face-to-face (or even voice-to-ear) time we spend and the less practice we get at reading the nonverbal cues.” ― Marc Brackett, [Permission to Feel: The Power of Emotional Intelligence to Achieve Well-Being and Success](https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/68114068)

> “Back in the eighteenth century, the poet Alexander Pope said it well: “All looks yellow to the jaundiced eye.” If you go through life angry, you will see anger everywhere you look. The same is true of other emotions—even positive ones.” ― Marc Brackett, [Permission to Feel: The Power of Emotional Intelligence to Achieve Well-Being and Success](https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/68114068)