Books About Emotions I Recommend
Here are my favorite books about the BIG 5 Feelings (MAD, SAD, GLAD, SCARED, NUMB, SHAME), personal growth, relationships, and professional development!
This page contains affiliate links that may benefit me. You’re welcome to search them on Amazon directly!
Jump to a specific section for the corresponding recs:
Books About Emotions
BOOKS ON ANGER
Rage Becomes Her:
The Power of Women’s Anger
[Soraya Chemaly]
“Anger has a bad rap, but it is actually one of the most hopeful and forward thinking of all our emotions. It begets transformation, manifesting our passion and keeping us invested in the world. It is a rational and emotional response to trespass, violation, and moral disorder. It bridges the divide between what “is” and what “ought” to be, between a difficult past and an improved possibility. Anger warns us viscerally of violation, threat, and insult.”
Reclaim your rightful influence and restore your worth and belonging by tapping into your inner power source.
Radical Candor: how to get what you want by saying what you mean
[Kim Scott]
The strongest relationships form when BOTH you and the other person make room for BOTH of your needs & wants. One person is not inherently more important than the other.
What makes this reciprocity possible? The ability to clearly and directly advocate for yourself while considering the well-being of both yourself and the other — what Kim Scott calls “Radical Candor”.
In this book, Scott outlines the four types of relationship styles: Ruinous Empathy, Obnoxious Aggression, Insincere Manipulation, and Radical Candor. Find out what your style is!
The Evolution of a Girl
[L. E. Bowman]
There is a difference between
those who
do not love you
and those who
do not know how.The answer
is often found
in the way they
love themselves.
In this book of poems, L.E. Bowman paints a beautiful picture of the journey from heartbreak to wholeness.
Sit with a verse or two, and see what feelings stir up that tell you what you’re needing and how you can tenderly care for yourself.
BOOKS ON SADNESS
There is No Good Card for This: what to say and do when life is scary, awful, and unfair to people you love
[Kelsey Crowe, Ph.D. & Emily McDowell]
Ever put your foot in your mouth when all you were wanting to do is to comfort your loved one in times of loss or hardship? I def have.
Emily McDowell, creator of the bestseller Empathy Cards, teams up with grief, illness, and loss specialist Kelsey Crowe (who herself is a cancer survivor) to bring to you all the things that would actually be helpful for those who are going through trying times.
This is a great resource to grow your true empathy muscles. Who knows, maybe you could also heal your own tender wounds along the way.
Necessary Endings:
The employees, businesses, and relationships that all of us have to give up in order to move forward
[Henry Cloud]
Endings are natural, essential, and strategic to our personal and professional development. However, we tend to avoid or botch them:
We hold onto things way past their expiration date
We do not know if an ending is actually necessary, or if “it” or “he” is fixable
We are afraid of the unknown and all the feelings
We fear conflict to not cause pain
Prune away what’s weighing you down so that you can freely and powerfully step forward.
The Rabbit Listened
[Cori Doerrfeld]
Oh no — something terrible happened to Taylor! The furry + feathered friends try to help, but end up making Taylor feel even worse…
But not the Rabbit.
A simple but rich story for kids & grownups alike in how to best show up for our loved ones who are having a hard time. Have a read and find out — What are the go-to animals you summon?
Understanding Depression and Finding Hope
[Gary Kinnaman & Richard Jacobs]
If you’re a person of faith who’s feeling extra ashamed because (apparently) you’re not supposed to be depressed, this book is for you!
This book challenges the myths around depression and offers tools for every area of life — physical, emotional, psychological, and spiritual.
Whether you’re wanting something extra for yourself or a loved one, this is a helpful guide!
*NOTE — this is meant to be a supplement, not replacement for therapy. Insight helps, but there’s a limit to how much you can work out of depression with just self-awareness!
BOOKS ON JOY
The Courage to Be Disliked +
The Courage to Be Happy (Sequel)
[Ichiro Kishimi & Fumitake Koga]
Rarely do we consider just how much influence our own self-narratives have over our lives. In a conversation with the Young Man, the Philosopher illuminates how we often create our own cages with the stories we tell about life, ourselves, and others.
What are some ways you’ve gotten yourself tangled up and self-sabotaged your own life? How do we liberate ourselves from the limitations we placed on ourselves?
The Joy of NOT Working:
a book for the retired, unemployed, and overworked
[Ernie J. Zelinski]
If you tend to drown yourself in work to deal with your feelings, or if you feel super anxious when there’s NOTHING to do — this is for you!
If you don’t have readily available ways for you to get your needs & wants upfront, ‘tis a ticking time bomb ‘til your body shuts down or rebels against your whipcracking.
This book provides so many creative ideas and exercises for you to dream outside of the box so you can live your fullest life now and not postpone it for later, maybe!
Finding Flow: the psychology of engagement with everyday life
[Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi]
The quality of life does not depend on happiness alone, but also on what one does to be happy. If one fails to develop goals that give meaning to one’s existence, if one does not use the mind to its fullest, then good feelings fulfill just a fraction of the potential we possess…Without dreams, without risks, only a trivial semblance of living can be achieved.
Learn the joy of complete engagement by discovering your FLOW STATE (aka being “in the zone”), where the experience is a reward in itself.
BOOKS ON FEAR
Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents
how to heal from distant, rejecting, or self-involved parents
[Lindsay C. Gibson]
If you spend your life paying attention to and managing other people’s emotions, you might be working out of old patterns. You grew up with parents who you surpassed in emotional maturity a LONG time ago — but because this is all you knew, you thought that this is just how relationships are.
If you’re tired of relationships where you manage other people’s feelings and want to build vibrant relationships what take care of you, too, it’s time to work through the past and finally fill your unmet childhood needs.
The Courage to Be Disliked +
The Courage to Be Happy (Sequel)
[Ichiro Kishimi & Fumitake Koga]
Rarely do we consider just how much influence our own self-narratives have over our lives. In a conversation with the Young Man, the Philosopher illuminates how we often create our own cages with the stories we tell about life, ourselves, and others.
What are some ways you’ve gotten yourself tangled up and self-sabotaged your own life? How do we liberate ourselves from the limitations we placed on ourselves?
BOOKS ON NUMBNESS
Running on Empty: overcome your Childhood Emotional Neglect
[Jonice Webb]
This book is for you if you:
feel like there’s something wrong with you but you just can’t quite put your finger on it
are emotionally flat but feel long-term, low-grade dissatisfaction and disconnection
don’t know how to talk about feelings (alexithymia), either your own or others’
It’s easier to identify the PRESENCE of BAD than the ABSENCE of GOOD, of what really NEEDED but you DIDN’T GET growing up. This helps you with the latter.
Burnout:
the secret to unlocking the stress cycle
[Emily Nagoski & Amelia Nagoski]
Why must burnout be the baseline experience for women? Women are bombarded with contradictory messages, rarely given the chance to just BE.
Our bodies are on a rollercoaster that’s stopped partway through, stuck in a state of constant stress and depletion.
Help your body finally make it to rest & relief with these super helpful stories and strategies. This is not adding YET ANOTHER thing on your to-do list, but to actually (f*cking!) take things off your plate forever — like other people’s expectations and responsibilities.
So Few of Me
[Peter H. Reynolds]
“If only there were two of me.”
As soon as Leo wishes this, another Leo appears! And another…and another.
But wait…Why aren’t things getting any easier?
What if there was another way out of this overwhelming overcomplication of overdoing?
As a recovering overcomplicator, this has been super helpful in finding my anchor and joy in SIMPLICITY.
BOOKS ON SHAME
I Thought It Was Just Me (But It Isn’t): Making the journey from “What will people think?” to “I am Enough”
[Brené Brown]
If you take a room full of people who all feel like they’re lesser or not enough, who’s right? The nature of SHAME is that:
It gets us to compare to others
It leads us to feel broken or bad
It isolates us, and in that isolation, it gets louder.
Find out what the antidote to shame is so that you can live fuller, bolder lives with a greater ability to love ourselves and others well.
The Dot
[Peter H. Reynolds]
Vashti stares as the piece of paper in front of her, her inner critic loud as a megaphone: “I can’t draw!”
With a smile, her wise teacher gives her a challenge:
“Just make a mark and see where it takes you.”
Here’s a story about openness, curiosity, and boldness that gives you courage to break out of your own perfectionism trap.
Pinduli
[Janell Cannon]
Here’s a story about self-image, self-acceptance, the power of words, and others’ judgments.
Dog, Lion, and Zebra keep making fun of Pinduli’s ears, mane, and stripes…making her forget her mama’s words that she’s the most beautiful hyena ever.
Deeply embarrassed, Pinduli does her very best to try to disappear or hide what she doesn’t like about herself…until that itself takes on a life of its own.
Books on EXPRESSING EMOTIONS
Draw Your Feelings
a creative journal to help connect with your emotions through art
[Rukmini Poddar]
When words fail, art prevails!
Restore your relationship with yourself and others by connecting with all of your emotions.
A workbook version of the fantastic workshops Rukmini does, this book will give you plenty of helpful prompts, tested tips, and wise guidance to work through your feelings through your medium of choice.
The Body Keeps the Score
brain, mind, and body in the healing of trauma
[Bessel van der Kolk]
You might have fuzzy memories about what painful things you went through, but your body remembers FOR you — whether you like it or not, but always on your behalf.
When you have incongruent emotions (feelings that don’t match the current situation based on frequency, intensity, duration, or direction), your body is trying to catch your attention that you have some important pains to heal and needs to fill.
Rather than judging yourself for getting triggered, what if you were to work WITH your body to work THROUGH the deeply buried feelings?
Books on PERSONAL GROWTH
I grew up believing that there‘s something deeply wrong with me because I experience the world very differently from others. I don’t remember how many times I’ve been told,
“You’re too intense!”
“You’re overreacting!”
“Stop crying!”
Turns out, my nervous system is actually wired differently to take in much more sensory and emotional input and to process them at a much deeper level.
Instead of beating myself up for being different, I am learning to identify and acknowledge my unique strengths, be gentler on myself, and find my own ways to bring color and music to the world.
Enneagram Guide to Waking Up
find your path, face your shadow, discover your true self
[Beatrice Chestnut & Uranio Paes]
The Enneagram is a map for your personality that reveals your autopilot patterns of thinking, feeling, and doing that run you without you even knowing it.
You are NOT your Enneagram type: you are far MORE than your type, but your type is where you got STUCK.
You can’t change what you don’t know is already happening. So find out how your autopilot works so you can finally grow BEYOND it.
What Fresh Hell is This?
perimenopause, menopause, other indignities, and you
[Heather Corinna]
Perimenopause? Even though this is the overall backdrop of internal and external transitions we’re dealing with that stirs up all these BIG feelings, no one freakin’ talks about it!
Learn about the things about what’s happening in your body, mind, and relationships during this Transition Period before Menopause, along with some practical tips to help you navigate this hormonal hurricane.
Books on RELATIONSHIPS
The Highly Sensitive Person in Love: understanding and managing relationships when the world overwhelms you
[Elaine N. Aron]
Our abilities to pick up on subtleties that others often miss are the Highly Sensitive Person’s double-edged sword in relationships. If you and your partner understand each other, the relationship is fantastic. But if not, that very asset is what makes those connections super painful and conplicated.
Grab this book to learn more about yourself or your HSP partner so that you can build a deeper and more vibrant relationship that makes room for all the feels.
Running on Empty No More: transform your relationships with your partner, your parents, & your children
[Jonice Webb]
[This book] opens doors to richer, more connected relationships by naming the elephant in the room.
A sequel to Running on Empty, this book describes how Childhood Emotional Neglect (CEN) impacts our significant relationships.
Running on Empty helps you heal your relationship with yourself. Running on Empty No More helps you do the same with your loved ones.
Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents
how to heal from distant, rejecting, or self-involved parents
[Lindsay C. Gibson]
If you spend your life paying attention to and managing other people’s emotions, you might be working out of old patterns. You grew up with parents who you surpassed in emotional maturity a LONG time ago — but because this is all you knew, you thought that this is just how relationships are.
If you’re tired of relationships where you manage other people’s feelings and want to build vibrant relationships what take care of you, too, it’s time to work through the past and finally fill your unmet childhood needs.
Books on PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
The Secret Thoughts of Successful Women (and Men)
why capable people suffer from Impostor Syndrome and how to thrive in spite of it
[Valerie Young]
Why is it that those who are actually competent minimize their worth and those who are extremely incompetent make themselves out to be the best?
Maybe the anxiety, guilt, and shame we struggle with are because we’ve absorbed other people’s BS messages, expectations, and blame. Time to spit it out!
This book provides lots of great insight and tips to help you rediscover and step into your rightful power.
Add these to your reading list!
The BIG Feelings Masterclass
Want a more thorough overview of why feelings work the way they do?
Learn how to turn your soul-sucking emotional roller coaster into your life-giving power source with this 1-hour masterclass!
Other Blogs on Emotions
© Copyright 2023 Joanne Kim. All rights reserved.
Joanne Kim, Feelings Translator
Hi! I’m a therapist-turned feelings coach who helps Highly Sensitive Persons, Empaths, Enneagram 2s & 4s, etc. turn their BIGGEST feelings into their GREATEST superpower!
They are often the first (or only) person in their family to intuitively process and express feelings; consequently, they are often judged or criticized so that they learn to people please, placate, or perform until they hit a wall.
They’re super familiar with anxiety, guilt, and shame, partly because of an allergic reaction to anger (theirs and others').
Often the super responsible, empathic, and ethical person in their environments, they reach out to me after they're already burned out, resentful in their relationships, or sucked into their shame spiral.
The most common feedback I get from people when I share about how feelings work is,
"Why didn't anyone teach me this in school??"
Hence, I am building a school helping people work WITH their feelings so their feelings work FOR them.