One problem I always seem to have is that I’m unable to evaluate what mood I’m in. The concept of a 1-10 scale of happiness is something I can’t relate to. There are times when I recognize that I’m feeling better than usual, but it’s always because I’m excited about a specific occurrence or new thing I’ve learned.
It seems to me that I’m always just… living. I don’t feel any sign that there are these foreign constructs called ‘emotions’ that arbitrarily have their way with my consciousness. That’s why when I’ve experienced with my own bouts of ‘suicidal ideation’, I’ve found it impossible to label them as ‘depression’, ‘destructive’, or anything other than just that: ideation. My thoughts are my thoughts. If something makes sense and sounds appealing, at what point does one blame ‘emotions’ for affecting his/her conclusions. I don’t understand how these things work.
I think I’m the opposite of you. My emotions are easily triggered by just about anything, to the point that it’s quite easy for me to recognize that they were triggered, and don’t represent my beliefs/attitudes towards things. If I see a baby, I feel a strong rush of warm-fuzziness, but I can pinpoint easily that it’s caused by the baby. A “foreign construct” that “arbitrarily has its way” with my consciousness is exactly what it feels like, although depending on the emotion, I may like or dislike feeling them. I think I’m also better at shutting down and ignoring my emotions than at least some people, especially when it comes to anger; if I’m paying attention, I can recognize that it’s hijacking my brain into thinking things I don’t want to think or doing things I don’t want to do, and I can persuade myself not to be angry anymore. Sadness is probably the emotion I can control the least, just because it saps my motivations whereas anger almost strengthens them. I can occasionally mutate sadness into anger and then persuade myself not to be angry. Happiness I don’t try to reduce, obviously.
I can kind of identify with this and I think there’s just a broad range of sensitivity when it comes to emotion. Some people have these “feelings” way more than others. There have been times when people have reacted incredibly strongly to certain things (crying, etc) when I have had basically no reaction whatsoever.
However, I can personally identify emotional constructs through many particular examples of experiences. If you’re a younger individual, I suspect it takes a longer time to build up these examples.
Agreed. Also I don’t think the ability to control emotions is linked to their strength necessarily. Strength of emotions seems to be a innate facet of someone’s personality, whereas control is improved by practice.
For the reference of people reading this thread in the future (most likely), there is a personality trait called alexithymia, which refers to the inability to classify one’s own emotions. As the sibling comments point out, though, ability to distinguish and ability to feel emotions are probably orthogonal and the parent commenter just happened to get the short end of the stick.
One problem I always seem to have is that I’m unable to evaluate what mood I’m in. The concept of a 1-10 scale of happiness is something I can’t relate to. There are times when I recognize that I’m feeling better than usual, but it’s always because I’m excited about a specific occurrence or new thing I’ve learned.
It seems to me that I’m always just… living. I don’t feel any sign that there are these foreign constructs called ‘emotions’ that arbitrarily have their way with my consciousness. That’s why when I’ve experienced with my own bouts of ‘suicidal ideation’, I’ve found it impossible to label them as ‘depression’, ‘destructive’, or anything other than just that: ideation. My thoughts are my thoughts. If something makes sense and sounds appealing, at what point does one blame ‘emotions’ for affecting his/her conclusions. I don’t understand how these things work.
I think I’m the opposite of you. My emotions are easily triggered by just about anything, to the point that it’s quite easy for me to recognize that they were triggered, and don’t represent my beliefs/attitudes towards things. If I see a baby, I feel a strong rush of warm-fuzziness, but I can pinpoint easily that it’s caused by the baby. A “foreign construct” that “arbitrarily has its way” with my consciousness is exactly what it feels like, although depending on the emotion, I may like or dislike feeling them. I think I’m also better at shutting down and ignoring my emotions than at least some people, especially when it comes to anger; if I’m paying attention, I can recognize that it’s hijacking my brain into thinking things I don’t want to think or doing things I don’t want to do, and I can persuade myself not to be angry anymore. Sadness is probably the emotion I can control the least, just because it saps my motivations whereas anger almost strengthens them. I can occasionally mutate sadness into anger and then persuade myself not to be angry. Happiness I don’t try to reduce, obviously.
I can kind of identify with this and I think there’s just a broad range of sensitivity when it comes to emotion. Some people have these “feelings” way more than others. There have been times when people have reacted incredibly strongly to certain things (crying, etc) when I have had basically no reaction whatsoever.
However, I can personally identify emotional constructs through many particular examples of experiences. If you’re a younger individual, I suspect it takes a longer time to build up these examples.
I think strength of emotional reactions and ability to distinguish between them are independent variables.
Agreed. Also I don’t think the ability to control emotions is linked to their strength necessarily. Strength of emotions seems to be a innate facet of someone’s personality, whereas control is improved by practice.
For the reference of people reading this thread in the future (most likely), there is a personality trait called alexithymia, which refers to the inability to classify one’s own emotions. As the sibling comments point out, though, ability to distinguish and ability to feel emotions are probably orthogonal and the parent commenter just happened to get the short end of the stick.