WHY IDENTIFY AN EMOTION: Why invest so much effort to categorise, rate and label our emotions? First, it makes us feel them! That is essential! But this labelling can seem like a lot of work. Why should we do it?
COMPUTER ANALOGY: Think of an emotion as a computer file on your brain’s ‘hard drive’. In order to fully process & release a suppressed emotion, you must find that ‘computer file’ again. Finding a file is easier if you know the file name or description! Correctly labelling an emotion file allows use of the ‘search function’ on your mental computer. Then retrieval is fast & accurate.
MISPLACED EMOTIONS: If you don’t give an emotion a clear name, the stored ‘emotion file’ could get misplaced or confused with other files. By accurately labelling the emotion, you can more easily locate it for final processing & clearing. Bad labelling can result in some emotion files remaining lost and unprocessed! So, remember to briefly feel your emotions to correctly label them!
PROCESSING THE FILE: After fully processing an emotion, you can DELETE other unhelpful parts of that file from your active memory! You can also MOVE valuable parts into a ‘dealt with’ or ‘wisdom gained’ folder.
PRACTISE feeling an emotion well enough to accurately characterize it.
Accurately LABELING an emotion makes it easier to LOCATE again