Emotions indicate that there is active energy present. If the client shows emotion about a certain subject it indicates that it is alive enough for her, she is interested enough in it to get something out of working with it.
We say that a subject has a load or is loaded when there is emotion there that isn't flowing. Something is building up. This can be positive as well as negative emotion. The person might be excited about a potential that she hasn't yet found out how to tap. Or she might be building up anger about something she can't deal with. Or she is holding on to sorrow from some past event.
Theoretical discussions about what is right or wrong, what happened or didn't happen, etc., isn't going to do much for people. Working on what they feel something about is what will matter. And if the client doesn't seem to feel much at all, we need to find what it is she is building up and not feeling.
You can't theorize yourself to what areas much be loaded. We need to observe the actual individual, not just make logical suggestions. One person might have no emotional load whatsoever on having been shot at in Vietnam. Another might have a big emotional load on breaking a nail. We go by the most available emotional load, not by what ought to have the biggest reaction.
Most loads exist in the form of a potential load. That means that currently there is no active emotion on it, but there would be under certain circumstances. Certain phenomena would activate or trigger the emotion and then it can be dealt with.
Many clients don't appear very emotional at first. That doesn't really stop us. We will still steer by emotion. There has to be something she is interested in, or afraid of, or whatever, even if she doesn't show it very strongly. The key point is to steer by the emotion, not by any logical discussion.