Becoming Emotionally Intelligent by Identifying Emotions
Emotional identification is understanding how we feel in a variety of situations. Why is this important? Does understanding how we truly feel about something really matter?
Part of our emotional intelligence (EQ) is emotional identification. We need to understand how we are feeling in order to recognize the emotions in others, develop social awareness, manage our relationships in a healthy manner, and understand ourselves fully. If we don’t know how we are feeling at a particular moment, we can react in ways that maybe don’t really reflect our true feelings or people may interpret our actions incorrectly but if we don’t know how we really feel, we cannot correct them.
Emotional identification helps us to describe how we feel to someone so that we can relate to others. We are social creatures and one of our basic needs is to feel like we belong and we cannot belong if we cannot relate. To be able to relate is through understanding and that is where describing and identifying our emotions in a particular situation makes us feel connected to others.
By understanding how we feel, not only can we communicate that to someone, but that other person who may also be emotionally intelligent can connect to us. This ultimately builds intimacy, trust, and rapport in relationships.
We first start to learn emotional identification when we are 3 years old. We may be very basic with our language but we can identify if we are “happy, sad, or mad” within a given situation. This is also where we learn body awareness and our behavior when we feel particular ways. Even though we may identify this in ourselves, it does take a while to relate and identify it socially with others. But, it is very difficult to interpret others’ emotions if we cannot grasp and understand our own.
If we have pretty effective caregivers during this time, they may be able to show us how to identify and regulate our emotions and recognize emotions in others as we age. If we had struggling caregivers, we may have missed this stage completely or if we were raised in a chaotic environment, we may look to our environment to affirm how we should feel instead of identifying it within ourselves. This is where codependency can be created.
So for the individuals who struggle identifying their emotions, I want to introduce the feeling wheel:
This feelings wheel is from rewardcharts4kids.com
The feeling wheel is very helpful in that it provides a wide vocabulary to aid in identifying emotions but it also pushes you to sit with the emotion in order to identify it.
How to use the feeling wheel:
The middle is basic emotions and you can start there if you need somewhere simple to work with. Then extend out into the middle and work with each emotion to see if it fits what you are feeling. Don’t be surprised if more than one fits. We normally don’t feel one emotion at a time. Then once we identify the middle emotion, that will be broken down into 2 different types of that emotion outside the circle. This can help you label what it is you are feeling.
If you have a pretty good vocabulary of emotions, sometimes it is helpful to break down a more complex emotion into a simple one to help process it more effectively. So you can start off on the edge of the circle and work your way into the center. For example, if you are feeling overwhelmed, that breaks down into anxious, and that breaks down into fear. What is making you feel afraid is a different question than what is making you feel overwhelmed. This can help process the emotion to a deeper level even though we simplified it.
Try using your body when identifying emotions. We normally feel our emotions in our body first before our head catches up and classifies them into an emotion. This is another reason why understanding emotions are highly effective. For example, we feel the same when we are excited and anxious in our bodies. Our brain is what classifies whether or not we are feeling excited or anxious based on our environment, past experiences, and the situation.
So when you sit with your emotions, try asking yourself, where do I feel this in my body? This can help you identify this same emotion or find relatability among other emotions in the future. Ultimately leading you to be more emotionally intelligent.
