Emotions and Feelings and Moods

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Kanjou [感情] translates to mean, "emotion; feelings; sentiment." The first character means, "emotion; feeling; sensation," and the second means, "feelings; emotion; passion; sympathy; circumstances; facts." 

Caveat: I am NOT a medical professional of any sort, kind or discipline. This posting is from my studies of the subject matter and mine alone. Everything herein MUST be validated by your sources and professional medically qualified folks. This is simply my thoughts on the subject to gain some insight as to how I can accept, recognize and label emotions, feelings and moods all of which can be found in conflicts and those situations where avoidance and deescalation can be achieved. 

In karate and many other martial disciplines we are taught that to be successful we must "control" our emotions and that may not be the best path to follow in that regard. It often leads to folks taking on an incorrect form of stoicism rather than learning about emotions, learning how to recognize them and how to accept them as a part of human survival because there is no possible way to avoid them, suppress them or rid them completely from our minds. 

In truth, to suppress, avoid or rid them tends to trigger just the opposite in our minds and therefore in our bodies because those efforts will trigger negative results both in the immediate and over the longer haul of life. There are ways to achieve emotional maturity of the kind that becomes a skill so that our abilities allow us to deal with emotions in a way they no longer stand as obstacles to achieving positive outcomes and no where is this more important than when folks face off with violence, conflicts and dangerous situations. 

The art of avoidance embraces this very concept of acceptance, recognition, understanding and to deal with said emotions be they happiness or anger or fear or any of the emotional states that every single external stimulus triggers in our minds and thus bodies. 

One thought is that we must attain a state of contentment to achieve emotional maturity and an ideal state of emotion necessary to apply our skills in conflict and when violence strikes. The state of contentment is that apex of the yin/yang where yin are the positive emotions and yang are the negative emotions. Contentment is that state of being where emotions come and go as stimulated internally and from the external environment. It is that state of emotional rest like a calm ebb and flow of morning tide on a calm lakeshore or a slight breeze that results in the calm sway of the branches and leaves of a great oak tree. 

Feelings and Emotions: feelings are learned behaviors triggered by external events. Emotions are event-driven that involves little to no cognitive awareness.

Emotions: are chemicals released in response to our interpretation of a specific trigger.  It takes our brains about 1/4 second to identify the trigger, and about another 1/4 second to produce the chemicals.  By the way, emotion chemicals are released throughout our bodies, not just in our brains, and they form a kind of feedback loop between our brains & bodies. They last for about six seconds.

Feelings: happen as we begin to integrate the emotion, to think about it, to “let it soak in.”  In English, we use “feel” for both physical and emotional sensation — we can say we physically feel cold, but we can also emotionally feel cold.  This is a clue to the meaning of “feeling,” it’s something we sense.  Feelings are more “cognitively saturated” as the emotion chemicals are processed in our brains & bodies. Feelings are often fueled by a mix of emotions, and last for longer than emotions.

Moods: They’re not tied to a specific incident, but a collection of inputs.  Mood is heavily influenced by several factors: the environment (weather, lighting, people around us), physiology (what we’ve been eating, how we’ve been exercising, how healthy we are), and finally our mental state (where we’re focusing attention and our current emotions). Moods can last minutes, hours, probably even days.

Feelings are sensations we are aware of and can be physical, meaning we experience them as happening in the body such as numbness, tingling, pain, an itch, or goose bumps, etc. Feelings that are NOT physical are called emotions such as joy, frustration, gratitude, anger, despair as examples of feelings that are also emotions. 

"Frustration, despair, angst, anxiety, hurt, grief, unhappiness, envy, jealousy, and all the other painful emotions are catalysts of change in our lives. They motivate us to do things differently, to change our status quo." -  Kate Levinson

Because we tend to confuse emotions with behavior, anger is often confused with intentional behaviors like aggression and violence. But, like all feelings, pure anger is neither an intention nor a behavior. It's just a feeling, with no ability to harm. 

It is also good to note, remember and understand that feelings/emotions can be caused or worsened by medical conditions. Blood sugar and hormone levels, lack of sleep, heart problems, and other physical conditions can directly affect your emotions. Get a physical and then once you know that physical health is not directly causing your feelings, you can then psychologically work to deal with your emotions and feelings. 

Witness, accept, claim, allow, tolerate, or embrace your feelings and emotions - all of them both positive and negative. Be aware of how you feel and those resulting emotions. 

When I speak of emotional maturity I am actually speaking to emotions, feelings as we are taught by external stimuli along with experiences of parents and family while moos are a collective, "influenced by several factors: the environment (weather, lighting, people around us), physiology (what we’ve been eating, how we’ve been exercising, how healthy we are), and finally our mental state (where we’re focusing attention and our current emotions)."

If we are not aware and understanding of our moods; if we are not aware and understanding of our feelings; if we are not aware of and understanding and accepting of our emotions then we lack emotional maturity. Emotion in this example and concept involves all three, i.e., emotions, feelings and mood. 

To attain emotional maturity we need to develop certain skills. One is constructive emotional immersion, i.e., take part in all emotional responses using an objective of perception through stoicism toward a state of contentment of the moment creating a mind of ease and emotional stability.

When stress hits the mind triggers both psychological and physical responses often felt like the brain locking into a negative and the body muscles tensioning to a point where one cannot think and move or act. To alleviate this one can ease the mind and body due to experiences and/or training like “combat breathing” to reduce adverse effects allowing a star on contentment resulting in a mind at ease that allows the mind to be set free and the body to achieve a state of positive relaxation so both can act in appropriate and efficient ways to overcome such obstacles and barriers.

“Attentive Awareness” ? Or, active awareness as in active listening because awareness is both a conscious effort as well as a subconscious one. Folks in modern times suppress the conscious side like the times you sense something that makes you feel strange and you simply shrug and go on. To be truly aware you have to actively and attentively BE aware.

Attentive requires a foundation of data of relevancy to the given situations. So when encountered the mind has stored memories triggering actions and deeds appropriate to that moment. We then become aware of the feelings and emotions they trigger then analyze them with the objective of controlling them and taking their control away from them to our conscious and unconscious mind. 

Create a data-base of memories based on academic AND of an experiential nature. Experiential as in hands-on actual as well as hands-on training and practices. Allowing free flow emotions and feelings while understanding their sources is about energy consumption. 

Confused yet, well there is always hope out there and the following is a good start to build on emotional maturity and attentive awareness for that awareness is just one of many where emotions, feelings and moods are how we find ease of mind or contentedness that results in efficiency in apply skills for self-protection. 

Gilbertson, Tina. "Constructive Wallowing: How to Beat Bad Feelings by Letting Yourself Have Them." Viva Editions. Simon and Schuster. May 19, 2014. 

• Self-talk, critical in that your self-talk as you go about your day effects you so make sure the words you direct at yourself in your head are supportive rather than critical. This is one way to feel your emotions, feelings and moods until you have more time to devote to a meditative eye toward them.
• To accept our emotions, feelings and moods is a form of self-acceptance. 
• Emotions and feelings are what makes us whole. 
• Avoid suppressing our emotions and feelings or they will build, escalate and overwhelm causing depression and anxiety. 
• Feelings are not designed to hang around and once you feel them, they dissipate leaving room for the next experience. 

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