Identifying and Experiencing Emotions

For many, an eating disorder serves as a way to numb emotions.  Many people with eating disorders have a difficult time identifying their emotions, and may only experience "negative" or painful emotions.  When faced with the task of identifying their emotions, they may feel confused or even angry..."why do I need to feel my feelings if all I feel is pain?"  People with eating disorders are also often out of practice at experiencing, expressing, and moving through their emotions.  In many ways, the eating disorder has been their coping tool for dealing with difficult emotions, or even their way of communicating with others.  Therefore, it is important to learn how to experience and express emotions in a healthy and effective way.

So why feel?
Although some emotions can feel very painful, they actually serve many important purposes.  Emotions help us identify our values, understand and connect with others, communicate with others, make decisions, and motivate us to act.

Primary emotions actually have specific purposes.  For example, anger signifies that your values have been breached.  Fear signals that there is danger present, and motivates you to protect yourself and/or others.  Sadness indicates that you have lost something valuable, and joy tells you that you are managing your life well in the moment.  These are all important messages to tune in to.

Although it may feel better in the moment to avoid or push away your emotions, there are consequences to doing so.  First of all, when you avoid experiencing negative feelings, you also lessen your ability to feel positive emotions.  In addition, when you avoid your feelings, you have more difficulty connecting with yourself and others.  Therefore, in order to get in touch with yourself and experience a variety of emotions, you must learn how to identify your emotions, and then learn how to move through them.

Identifying your emotions:
There are hundreds of names for different emotions.  Although there is disagreement on the exact "core emotions," they tend to include joy, fear, shame, guilt, disgust, sadness, and surprise.  The following emotion wheel is divided into six core emotions and variations of those emotions differing in intensity.

 

Feelings start at a physical level and become emotions as you begin to interpret and place meaning on them.  If you can learn to tune into your body, your physical sensations will give you a clue as to what you are feeling.  Below is a list of common physiological experiences associated with different emotions...

Anger: muscles tighten, fists clench, tight stomach, flush or get hot, feel like you are going to explode, feel out of control, unable to stop crying, extremely emotional
Fear: shallow breathing, breathless, racing heart, pressure in the chest, lump in the throat, tense muscles, feeling nauseous, butterflies, feeling jittery, wanting to run away, wanting to scream
Joy: feeling lighter, more energetic, calm or open
Jealousy: wanting to hold onto what you have, wanting to eliminate your competition, feeling like you need to be in control
Sadness: feeling tired or lethargic, feeling as though nothing is pleasurable, feeling hollow or empty, crying
Shame: pain or pit in stomach, wanting to shrink, disappear or hide
Guilt: hot, flushing, feeling jittery, breathless

Emotions are also associated with "action urges," or the desire to take specific actions.  Tuning into your action urges is also a helpful way to identify what you are feeling.

Anger: punch, hit, attack, stomp, yell, slam doors, threaten, swear, criticize
Fear: run away, hide, avoid, nervously talk, cry, speechless, freeze, shake, sweat
Joy: smile, be bubbly, silly, hug, talkative, laugh
Jealousy: threaten, attempt to control another person, spy, interogate, cling
Sadness: avoid, sleep, act helpless, mope, withdraw, isolate, give up, talk little, slump, cry
Shame: hide, avoid, distract from yourself, withdraw, slump
Guilt: try to make amends or fix damages, apologzie, confess, make sacrifices for your transgression

Experiencing emotions:
I like to think of emotions as energy that takes up space in our mind and body.  The energy likes to move through us and be expressed outwardly.  However, if we repress our emotions, the energy does not go away.  Instead, it is stored.  It then has a tendency to transform in negative ways, such as turn into more painful feelings or elicit negative thoughts.  The energy still wants to escape, so it finds other ways out.  This is what the term "comes out sideways" refers to - when emotions come out in a different way than they were originally experienced.

An example of this idea is dealing with traffic on the way home from work.  Imagine I am on my way home from a long day at work and I get stuck in traffic.  I feel angry, annoyed and frustrated.  However, instead of letting myself experience these emotions, I tell myself, "I can't control the traffic so I shouldn't be angry," and I push the feelings aside.  When I get home, my roommate is in the kitchen making dinner.  We say hello to each other and make small talk, and I notice she is making a mess in the kitchen.  It annoys me but again I push it away.  As we are talking, I see her accidentally drop things on the floor and then drip her sauce across the stove top.  Finally I burst.  I yell at her for making such a mess and storm out.

What just happened?  Was I really angry about the messy kitchen?  Not really.  I believe this is a case of emotions coming out sideways.  I originally pushed away my anger and irritation in the car when I was sitting in traffic.  However, the energy did not vanish.  Instead, it got pushed down and transformed into anger that came out sideways towards my roommate.  In order for us to avoid emotions coming out sideways, we must learn to experience them in the moment. 

A common fear people have about emotions is that if they let themselves feel, the feeling will last forever and overwhelm them completely.  Although some emotions can feel overwhelming, emotions do not last forever.  Emotions have a natural ebb and flow to them, increasing and decreasing in intensity.  It can be helpful to use the image of energy in your body and mind that wants to move through you.

So how exactly do we move through our emotions?  There are many tools that you can experiment with...

• First identify what you are feeling.  Tune into your body, your thoughts, and your action urges.  Look at the wheel of emotions and notice what you identify with.
• Practice radical acceptance of your emotions instead of pushing them away.  Accept your emotions in the present moment without judgement.
• Follow your action urges in a healthy way.  For example, cry if you are feeling sad, stomp or slam doors if you are angry, or laugh if you are feeling happy.
• Journal about your feelings.
• Do art about your feelings.  A simple activity can be to get out materials and a piece of paper and simply "draw your feelings."  There is no correct way to do the activity, just let the emotions guide your work.
• Talk to someone about what you are experiencing.
• Listen to music that you can relate to in the moment.
• Practice breathing or meditation.
• In private, let your body move as it desires.  If you feel like stomping and pounding, do so.  If you feel like curling up in a tight ball and rolling on the floor, don't be afraid.  Follow what your body wants and put your thoughts and judgments aside.
• Practice experiencing emotions in small amounts.  Allow yourself to experience your feeling for a short amount of time such as 1 minute, and then distract yourself in a healthy way.  Return to the feeling for another short time, and then distract again.  Practice moving in and out of your feelings.
• Notice when experiencing your emotions comes naturally to you and learn from those experiences.  Give yourself credit for feeling, even if it is an "easy" emotion.

Important things to remember when you are practicing experiencing your emotions:

• You are strong enough to feel your emotions
• Your emotions will not overwhelm you, they will pass
• There is no right or wrong way to feel
• All emotions are valuable
• It takes time and practice to identify and experience your emotions - be gentle and compassionate with yourself
• There is no way to experience your emotions in a "perfect way" - you need to find what works for you
• You do not need to act on your feelings
• Everyone experiences feelings that are painful - there is nothing wrong with you for experiencing difficult feelings
• Emotions transform and change - just because you are experiencing a painful emotion right now does not mean it will always be that way
• You are capable of feeling the entire spectrum of emotions

***Although experiencing your emotions is positive, it is not always the right time and place to do so.  Please be SAFE.  Seek help and guidance from professionals, and only practice experiencing what you feel you are capable of handling.***

For more information on deciding when it is safe to experience your emotions, visit the post "To Feel or Not to Feel."