8/3/2019 June2011_ I Feel Therfore I Am

1/2

I feel

Many a time, we weara smile even when

our heart frowns indisapproval. Perhaps,communicating what

we really feel couldhelp handle thesituation better.

Let me start with a small episode that issupposed to be a joke: A passenger onthe hind seat of the cab touched thedriver from behind to ask him to stop. Thedriver screamed, lost control, nearly hit a bus,went upon the footpath and stopped close toa shop window. For a second everything went

quiet in the cab, then the driver said, Look,dont ever do that again. You scared me somuch! The passenger apologised and said,I didnt realise that a little tap on your backwould scare you so much! The driver replied,Sorry, its not really your fault. Today is myfirst day as a cab driver. Ive been driving a vancarrying dead bodies for the last 20 years.

How funny is that? Frankly, I did not find itfunny enough, maybe I have a poor sense of humour. But I was rather caught up in a chainof thoughts. What struck me was the drivers

awareness of the cause of his behaviour. If he was not aware of what caused the panicin him, he would have gone on to findsomething external to him to rationalise hiserratic behaviour so that he does not have tofeel bad about it. Let me explain. For instance,if he were to think something like, whyare these passengers so insensible and dontthey know that distracting the driver whiledriving can turn out to be disastrous? thenhe would not have felt anything abnormalabout his behaviour and would have happily(?)

continued with the same behaviour.

Dont we often do it? We can recall at least onesituation in which we did something and thensaid to ourselves, Why did I do that? Thesesituations may arise because we are not awareof ourselves our patterns of behaviour and

the underlying emotions. Becoming awareof and recognising patterns of responses tovarious situations is one of the prerequisitesto having some control over reactions andincreasing self-directedness. One of the firstand most basic steps for raising our emotionalquotient (EQ) is to identify our feelingsby name. The first step towards emotionalliteracy, according to Mayer and Saloveyis the capacity to perceive and to expressfeelings. Emotional intelligence cannot beginwithout this first step.

The purpose of developing our emotionalliteracy is to precisely identify andcommunicate our feelings. When we do this,we are helping Nature fulfil its design forour feelings. Thankfully, we have a plentifulvocabulary with which to describe and identifyour emotions. But unfortunately, most of usare never taught to make full use of this richvocabulary.

A good place to start is with simple, three-word sentences such as these: I feel sad. I feel

therefore I am

The Business Enterprise | June 2011

NLIG HTEN

8/3/2019 June2011_ I Feel Therfore I Am

2/2

Non-verbal Communication: Studies showthat up to 90% of our communication is non-verbal. When we communicate non-verbally

our bodies are literally expressing themselvesFor example, we think of those who willnot look us in the eyes as untrustworthy,dishonest, afraid or insecure. Our eyes havethe power to judge, to attract, and to frighten.Through our eyes we can show interest,boredom, disbelief, surprise, terror, disgust,approval and disapproval. Our faces oftenexpress what we are not saying verbally. Ourlips may tremble when we are afraid. Ourforehead wrinkles when we are concerned orconfused. And when people tap their fingersor feet they are usually feeling impatient.

After we learn to find the right word forour feeling and its intensity, the next stepis explaining why we feel what we feel. Atthis point, our analytical brain is called intoaction. We actually make things much easierfor ourselves and others when our languageis clear, direct and precise. When what wesay is consistent with the non-verbal cueswe unconsciously send out, we gain respectbecause we come across to others as a personof integrity. Clear, truthful communication is

not only helpful in personal relationships, butalso essential to a society. We will simply bemuch better off, when we all follow the goodold rule: Say what you mean and mean whatyou say.

For further reading:Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman

motivated. I feel offended. I feel appreciated.I feel hurt. I feel disrespected. Sometimes justby naming a feeling, we begin to actually feel

the feeling. It is, as if by naming it we give thebrain permission to access the emotional partof the brain. This step of identifying the feelingby name is essential to a high development of ones innate emotional processing abilities.Feeling words not only express a feeling, butthey also express the intensity of the feeling.By expressing intensity, they communicate thedegree to which our needs are being met andour values and beliefs are being upheld.

Often, it is socially unacceptable to directlyexpress certain emotions. We are too afraid of offending others or appearing unhappy. Sadly,we live in a world where appearances mattermore than reality. So instead of truthfullyexpressing our feelings clearly and directly, weexpress the same emotions indirectly, eitherthrough our actions or our body language.Sometimes we actually outright lie about ourfeelings. When we start to hide our feelings, lieabout them, or tell people only what we thinkthey want to hear, we impede communicationand distort reality.

Let me share with you some of the ways inwhich we miscommunicate our feelings:Masking Our Real Feelings: There are manyways we mask our real feelings. I know it isa plain lie, when I, at times, say I am fine,though I am obviously irritated, worriedor stressed. Sometimes, we intentionally orunintentionally substitute one feeling foranother. For example, if I say I hope I dontfail, I might actually be feeling afraid that Iwill!

Inconsistency: Often, our tone of voice or ourbody language contradicts the words we aresaying. None of us can totally hide our truefeelings, but many of us do try to disguise ourvoices to go along with the act. People who areespecially superficial even adopt the cosmeticvoices like TV actors in order to furtherconform to societal expectations and furthermask their true feelings.

Overuse: One of the ways we corrupt languageis to overuse a word. Consider the word love.We love corn soup, cricket, and our mothers.

Doesnt it seem that we should use a differentword for the way we feel about our parents asopposed to food?

Exaggeration: When we exaggerate ourfeelings we are lying in order to get attention.People who need to exaggerate have hadtheir feelings neglected for so long, they haveresorted to dramatisation to be noticed andcared about. Unfortunately, when they sendout false signals, they alienate people and riskbecoming like the boy who cried wolf. As thestory goes, because he sent out too many falsealarms, he was ignored when he truly neededhelp. Consider these exclamations, none of which are typically true in a literal sense: I feeldevastated; I feel decimated; I felt run over bya truck etc.

Minimisation: Many people minimise theirfeelings, particularly when they are upset,worried or depressed. They use expressionssuch as: Im fine. Ill be alright. Im okay, dontworry about me. There is nothing wrong.Indirect Communication: Because we are notskilled at directly expressing our feelings, weoften use indirect communication of ouremotions such as by using examples, figures

of speech, and non-verbal communication.Lets look at a few of these forms of indirectcommunication.

Using sentences that begin with I feellike... may be the most common form of communicating our feelings. The literal resultis that we often feel like labels, thoughts, andbehaviours, as we can see below:

I feel like (a label) - I feel like: ... an idiot ... ababy ... a failureI feel like (a thought) - I feel like: you arecrazy. I feel like it was wrong. I feel like he isgoing to win.

I feel like (behaviour) - I feel like: ... stranglinghim ... shooting him ... wringing his neck ...teaching him a lesson ... quitting ... giving up... jumping off of a cliff.

We typically use lot of such expressions,which actually camouflage our feelings andwhen we use them we dont get in touch withour feelings.

Bharath Gopalan

The writer is a Learning & Development pro-fessional and presently steers the L&D prac-tice at Madras Cements. He holds MastersDegrees in Psychology and Human ResourceManagement.

June 2011 | The Business Enterprise