Published on 12, July, 2020
Well well.. a very important topic for me.
How to name a feeling is a huge struggle. I could describe myself as a colour blind person who is looking at a very long colour palette. My emotions and feelings are the hundreds of colours in the palette and I'm the person who can't see more than blue, red and yellow and hundreds of shades of grey. Although I'm very sensitive and I know that my emotional landscape is very rich (hundreds of hues in my palette), I can't always name my feeling (recognise the hue for what it is), therefore I don't know how to manage it. An example, although I felt anxious in many situations in my life, I've never knew that this feeling is anxiety until last therapy session when my therapist said "when you feel anxious it's good to think of ...." And I was like "wait a minute, is this what I just described to her now (racing thoughts, restlessness, stomach pain..) is called anxiety? Wow, I finally have a name for this feeling!".. even tho I don't consider names as useful info at all, when it comes to feelings, I think it's important to name them in order to memorize it easily and research how to manage it.
Question here is, is there a book, therapy, technique or anything that would help me recognise and name my feelings? Also, am I now describing Alexithymia? I tend to really relate to others and it sort of feels like I could recognise how others feel more than myself..
Thank you for this :). It definitely can help at times.
Thanks for this! I've never seen this version before :)
Does this help? Or google 'feeling wheel' for other versions.
There are a handful of core basic human emotions, with many subtler gradations. Due to alexithymia many autistic people struggle to identify and name their emotions, albeit we have very many, often quite intense ones.
Some folk find using the wheel as a guide to the range of possible emotions helps them pinpoint this to explain to others; a bit like knowing you want your bed room a certain shade of pink, but you've no idea what Dulux called it in order to ask the B&Q staff until you pull out their colour pallet to find it's 'dusky dawn', or 'rose petal' or something you should be asking for.
You're welcome! Please do let me know if you have any breakthough moments in this area and I'll do the same
Thank you!
Hi Ree, I struggle with describing and recognising emotions too and agree that it is likely Alexithymia. You Can do a lest on the Embrace Autism website for it which may help you understand your specific difficulties. https://embrace-autism.com/autism-tests/
I used to mostly describe feelings as 'good' or ' bad' with only a few sticking out from these two very general brackets. The feelings wheel has helped me to break down and think about what I am experiencing in more depth. There are lots of versions but here's one I've used blog.calm.com/.../the-feelings-wheel
When I was a child and later a teenager, whenever I had a strong feeling that I couldn't describe, I found myself writing a short story about imaginary creatures in some state or situation. Those creatures in those situations felt as I felt at the moment. I remember feeling something positive not very long ago, even tho I couldn't tell what was the exact feeling, I could imagine that it feels like a bird in the moment of taking off to fly from a high top. I'm still not sure if it was happiness, hopefulness, lightness or adventurous or excitement or what that feeling was, but I could only think of a bird looking ahead to a valley while spreading wings and making the small jump. Sometimes, I used to write letters to entities that didn't exist or a discussion between many about a topic.. I think that you might be right, I should stop trying to express myself in the expected way and just find my way to do it.
Hi thanks. Expressing love means someone feels love. If someone is happy they can feel love. Is happiness similar to love. Do all kinds of things share qualities with other things even if not exactly the same. An expression of grief is relief therefore aiming towards happiness and love so there has to be some element in the process.
I wonder do autistics feel on an edge of awareness level beyond simple categories so do not use words familiar to others experience. I don’t know.
Categorical words can be singular and time static object related. But if co-dependently originated and process related involving time of course there are no words for emotions as in maybe western etymology developing from Greek taxonomy. Rather than Autistics do not feel emotions.
I don’t know, just my joining my culture education neurodivergence with mindfulness.
I just thought of this idea. Perhaps you don't necessarily need to describe your feelings in emotions like NTs do. Instead, you can create your own system. When you start noticing feelings, write them down in a journal. I use Google Keep which is always accessible on my phone. Keep track of how you are feeling in your own words, but also keep track of events the occurred previously in the day. After a while, you might start to notice patterns, and this can help you become more aware of yourself and needs so you can adjust accordingly. If you want to label them as emotions, once you find your patterns, discuss them with someone you trust or a therapist, and maybe you guys can come up with some shirthand labels for the complexity of your feelings for the sake of communication or simplicity.
Adagio for Strings was written by Samuel Barber as an expression of him mourning his wife that had recently passed. It's beautiful because it expresses his love, but painful because he lost her and is accepting all of the consequences. It's a horrible despair based on the beauty of what once was, so he wrote her a song as a way of keeping her alive in some form forever because her life had such a lasting impact on humanity, that we are still discussing the piece written for her.
Thanks I will look that up,
The Adagio is definitely different to other forms of music. I wonder if the west we search for singular definitions of things. In Buddhism things can be seen as sharing properties with other things. If it was played at a funeral it might be uplifting and I would feel good in and a warmth in my heart area. If I listen to Smiley Happy People I would also feel a lift and warmth in my heart area.
I found Adagio / Agnus Dei very helpful a times. Calming, reassuring...
Calming is a good way to describe it.
"If I was dying I guess this music would be a nice soundtrack to go out to", this made me really laugh ! :D
Also, I do like this type of music too. People call it sad, I call it calming.
This is a great example of my favourite kind of music, which I describe as "sad beautiful music". It makes me feel sort of wistful and longing, not actually sad. It makes me smile and relax. If it had been played at a funeral of someone I loved then it might well make me feel sad. There is music which makes me cry because of the emotions it is linked to from sad times or funerals, but that could probably happen with an otherwise happy song as well as a sad one. If I was dying I guess this music would be a nice soundtrack to go out to, but I think it is harsh to call it that! Though I wouldn't describe it is as happy either.
Hi I understand. It took me a while to understand myself. I am not sure even if it is appropriate for me to post it. Don’t read it if you don’t want to. Maybe I am just weird lol!
I need to read this few times in different days to understand it
I think to start with when you're "in the thick of it" it's important to remember you don't have to feel like this, the feelings are valid but they will pass, that's the "cure" side, the prevention side of it was in developing better means of communicating how I'm feeling, if I'm feeling fragile or overwhelmed I have a safe word, or hand signal for if I go non verbal that i set up and explained to others in my life this means I'm in need of help or some time to retreat and step away before things go too far. It's also been quite good a reducing the amount of meltdowns I have in general.