We are emotional creatures with feelings, opinions and moods about ourselves, others and the events that happen in between. They inform us about what is safe, what is dangerous, what doesn’t matter and how we should respond. They also help us understand what those around us are going through, like when our partner is having a bad day; when our children aren’t feeling well; when our colleagues are super stressed; or even when our neighbors or people we meet in the street have received great news! Emotions help us navigate the world we live in more effectively, based on our ability to properly understand and live with them. They combine with our goals, our understanding of consequences and desired outcomes, our understanding of situations and so on. However, often times, emotions tend to get in the way of our interactions because of what things mean to us, because of our ability (or even inability) to assess and fully live our emotions accurately as well as our ability to express and interpret emotions. How many times have you gotten into an argument because you were already affected by something else?
Emotions and mood can set the stage on which events are played and perceived. These stages are built on the concepts and categories from past emotional experiences we’ve encountered. Therefore, how we respond to our environment and ourselves comes from our vast repertoire of personal responses, interactions and models of behavior from those around us. Our emotions can sometimes feel like inherited reflexes that tend to control us. This is because we have rapid response, ready-constructed ideas and predictions about the meanings of things and their consequences, again designed to help us effectively navigate the world around us. “Effectively,” I think falls short considering the complexities of life; that is to say, if our emotional experiences continue to feel like they are happening to us instead of voluntary chosen responses. Fortunately, we can become emotion masters by reflecting on our processes, the meanings they carry and how they come about in order to exert a more “in touch” type of living with our emotions. In doing so, emotions can work for us, not against us.
Living emotional instances can be difficult for some, overwhelming for others or even completely alien yet for others. It depends upon the environment in which they were constructed. Being “in touch” with our emotions means learning to live with them and letting them have their place, but just their place. Often times, fear, for example, can get the better of us because we over assess fear from worry or concern. By thinking about what the fear feels like, where it comes from, what it is relating to and what it is being based on, we can reassess whether fear is the right emotion or not. Likewise, we can also assess whether the thought patterns and behaviors that follow suit are conducive to fear or if they are exacerbating it or stifling it. All emotional experiences function like this.
If we consider fear for a moment, I think there are some ready-made expressions that we’ve culturally learned: Fear of death, fear of failure, fear of missing out, fear of loss, etc. I think in each instance of fear, we might find a very common conceptualization that our brain uses to predict and prepare for whether we should be afraid or not. I will be hurt really badly that I won’t be able to…. I won’t have the information or experience I need to be able to… If person X dies, I won’t be able to…
It seems fear represents this concept of being in a situation that is marked by the unknown, characterized by a feeling of no control or powerlessness, and riddled with an inability to respond to or manage the outcome of the situation. Precursors to this emotional attribution would be anticipation of the undesirable outcome and rumination, resulting in things like being concerned, worrying, catastrophizing and exaggerating. Based on your particular level of emotional granularity or precision, emotional intelligence and in-the-moment mood, a worrisome event could turn into full-blown fear. For example, there is a huge difference between two people with different levels of emotional awareness who are starting a new job and are unsure of their skills to perform the job accurately. An individual with a higher emotional granularity would likely just feel worried about their first day. On the other hand, the individual with poorer emotional precision will likely be stricken with fear and obsessive thoughts leading up to their first day on the job. It boils down to how well we can interpret and understand the situation we are going through, our bodily signals and thought patterns.
Why is this important though? What’s the difference if I am worried about starting my job or afraid of it? I think the simple answer is energy. Emotional instances that go off into the extremes tend to consume more time, more energy and more effort. The stress and actions that also correspond to extreme emotional expressions can be very taxing on the individual and lead to feeling overwhelmed and tired. This puts us in a diminished state, which is kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy loop. If my fear is based on an inability to respond correctly in a particular situation, and this situation is unavoidable, we end up wasting all of our resources on the less accurate emotional experience and put ourselves in a dilapidated state where we are effectively incapable of responding correctly to the situation. By tendering a more suitable emotional instance, like worry or concern, the cost of the stress and actions are lower, leaving us more resources to be able to perhaps respond in a more desirable way. Living with less accurate emotions can feel like a roller coaster and is exhausting.
If you are struggling with depression, anxiety, loneliness, grief, or trauma, it’s likely that you are additionally suffering with a lesser than adequate emotional toolbox. These tools may have been useful at some point, but as with everything, time makes their relevance more or less useful. Things change; we change. If you are struggling, this might be a sign that your emotional toolbox has some stuff that needs to be honed, sharpened, refined or upgraded. Fortunately, you are not alone and all is not lost. Therapy and workshops can help you learn to adapt your emotional skillset to better fit the ever-changing world in which you live and navigate it more successfully and healthily. By rebuilding your emotional concepts, learning how to better interpret your bodily signals, and discovering when and how to intervene in the emotional cascade, you can start down the path to living a healthier life with your emotions. Put down the less useful emotional burdens. Free yourself from feeling overwhelmed and tired. Equip yourself with the right tools to start down the path to a healthier, happier “you.”
For more reading, I suggest “How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain,” by L. Barrett Feldman, “The Remembered Present: A Biological Theory of Consciousness,” by G. Edelman, “The Believing Brain,” by M. Shermer, and “The Feeling of What Happens” and “Self Comes to Mind,” by A. Damasio.
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