Differentiation can feel cold if you are still fused. If you feel cold when you are refusing to be manipulated by another person's whining that is because you feel their pain and the effort of "switching off" the pain you feel for them would be like switching off your own pain - hence it feels cold. If you are in touch with your own emotions but compassionate towards the other's emotions then you can be guided to do the right thing according to your own emotions and your own thoughts and you don't feel cold.
When my kids are begging for something they can't have (like to watch a movie that is over their age group) they do their best to make me feel like a "bad mummy". I don't feel like a bad mummy because I know I'm being a good mum and protecting them from scenes that would likely disturb them and give them nightmares. Hence when I say "no" I do not feel like a cold person, I feel like someone who is protecting her children in an appropriate way. If I was fused with them I would give in because I wouldn't be able to deny the pain they are trying to transmit to me.
Until you manage to untangle your own emotions from the other person's you will continue to feel cold while acting differentiated. I guess when you get that cold feeling it's a sign you need to really concentrate on getting in touch with your own feelings on whatever's going on.
Fran
if we can be sufficient to ourselves, we need fear no entangling webs Erica Jong
