I grew up in a family (Southern, evangelical) in which we were usually not honest about our emotions, or judged many of them for being "wrong." I can testify that it's much better to own them than to repress them.

That said, I agree with you about letting them control us. I personally wouldn't talk about "taming" them, which comes a little too close to repressing them for me, but about examining them. You call for that, too, in your step #3. Many of our emotions have cognitive content; they reflect something reasonable and intuitive, as you note. They often deserve our attention!

Lovely piece, Kelly, and very well written.