Do you know the meaning of your emotions?

In this article we will see what emotions tell us and how to understand them.

Emotions are with us all day and throughout our lives. They are not something that we can "not have" although sometimes we do everything possible to avoid them..

Emotions, like thoughts, come and go. They are states that change if we let them follow their natural flow. Let's imagine our emotions as a guest. He comes, stays long enough and leaves.

The problem is that if we don't allow them to run their course and hold on to them, they stay longer than necessary, sometimes, making us suffer more than necessary.

From mindfulness, we understand that pain is inherent to the human being. Pain is always present in our lives. It is not the emotion that causes us suffering, if not, what we do with it. Many times, to avoid this pain, we "anesthetize" ourselves or we latch onto it without knowing how to let it go. It is something normal, we all do it sometimes because we have not been taught what to do with them.

A fundamental step to see what to do with them is understand what we are feeling. Understand what that emotion wants to tell us.

So, let's see what the following basic emotions want to tell us:

Sadness

Sadness is a basic "unpleasant" emotion. It comes to us when we have lost something we care about or someone we value and love. It can be something like the breaking of a vase of great sentimental value, a job, the breakdown of a relationship or the loss of a loved one..

When we feel sad, it means that that person or that something was very important to us. Therefore we must honor him as such.

We can recognize it because we will want to cry. We will feel an emptiness in the heart. We will have little desire to do things, etc..

Sadness, sociologically, invites us to be sheltered by others. To be cared for and that, as a group, we can get out of sadness more easily.

Afraid

Fear is an emotion that we can classify as "unpleasant". It is an emotion that we warns of possible dangers. In addition, it activates our body to flee, stay still or attack depending on the circumstance.

The function of this emotion is keep us safe and has done very well for thousands of years.

The problem is that our brain does not distinguish between life and death dangers or dangers that are not. Simply, if it feels threatened, it activates our flight-attack response. We feel things like heat in the body, the urge to run, tremors, sweats, flushing, tachycardia, etc. People with stage fright, for example, suffer from an overactivation of the nervous system.

Here we must assess if we are really in danger or is it a perception of our brain. We must remember that our brain is programmed to look for threats and protect ourselves from them.

Anger

Anger is an emotion that we could also classify as "unpleasant" since when we are angry we do not feel well.

Anger has a fundamental mission and has to do with limits. When we feel limited in some way and perceive an obstacle that is blocking us, we get angry (sometimes frustrated).

This tells us that we have to "self-improve"On the other hand, if we feel that someone is crossing our limits without taking us into account, we also get angry. This indicates that we must set limits to the other person. Anger drives us to act.

When we are angry, our jaw muscles tend to tense, we feel tachycardia, heat, etc..

Joy

Joy is one of the basic "pleasant" emotions. When we feel joy, we feel full, happy.

Joy is an emotion that It tells us that we like something. It tells us that we feel safe and that our basic needs are satisfied in some way. Joy is a sign that we are on the right track. It tells us that we want more of "that" that produces it..

When we feel joy we notice an openness in the body, a feeling of fullness, we smile and our muscles are relaxed.

As you may have noticed, I have not used the word "good" or "bad" to describe the above emotions..

I have purposely used the words "pleasant" and "unpleasant." This is because, despite what we may think, there are no good or bad emotions.

There are some that make us feel better (pleasant) than others (unpleasant), but they are all equally important. They all have something important to tell us. Therefore, it is essential to learn to listen to them. We must stop avoiding them and give ourselves the opportunity to feel them, as far as possible.