Throughout our day we are presented with different situations that influence the emotions we experience. Emotions accompany us throughout life and are present in our daily lives, probably much more than we have realized. Emotions try to protect us, take care of us and help us interpret what is happening around us, which makes them essential to us.
Many of us are probably not aware of our own emotions, but that does not mean that we are not experiencing them. Being aware of our own emotions is something that offers us many benefits, including the possibility of regulating these emotions. In the following Psychology-Online article, we explain in greater detail the emotional self-awareness: what it is, examples, importance and exercises.
What is emotional self-awareness
Emotional self-awareness refers to knowledge and recognition of our own emotions. Knowing our emotions, the sensations that may be associated and their causes and consequences, helps us to be able to recognize them from the moment they begin to appear.
The importance of emotional self-awareness lies in the fact that knowing our own emotions constitutes the first step and/or the fundamental step for the emotional regulation process. Therefore, being aware of our emotions allows us to be aware of our state, know it, analyze it and begin to work on it.
Behind many mental disorders, such as anxiety and , we find problems in emotional regulation. If we take into account what was stated in the previous paragraph, emotional self-awareness is key in the treatment of these disorders.
Effects of emotional self-awareness
Emotional states have a series of effects that involve different areas:
- Psychophysiological changes.
- Subjective-experiential effects: corresponding to the feelings and subjective effects resulting from emotions.
- Motor-behavioral effects: those actions that we ourselves carry out to change the conditions produced by the emotion.
Following Daniel Goleman, emotional awareness involves know what emotions we feel and why we feel them, know what links our feelings havethoughts, words and actions, how our feelings influence our performance and allows us to know our values and goals.
Examples of emotional self-awareness
Emotions accompany us throughout our lives and They are present in our daily lives. We are used to living with them that, sometimes, it is difficult for us to be aware of what we are feeling and why we are feeling it. If we think about everyday examples of our emotions, we will probably find those in which we have felt the emotions most intensely. Let’s look at some examples of emotional self-awareness:
- The wrath: emotion that we tend to be more aware of. When we get angry and feel anger, we very easily recognize the emotion as a whole and even the causes that led us to anger.
- Joy: emotion that we also tend to easily identify. It is a pleasant emotion that appears in situations that are gratifying to us, such as celebrations, reunions with people we love, carrying out activities that we find pleasant, etc. Most likely, most of us are aware that at that moment we are feeling joy.
- The fear: One of the examples of emotional self-awareness regarding fear would be, for example, when we are afraid of an animal and we encounter it. In this hypothetical situation, it would surely not be difficult for us to recognize our emotion in all its dimensions.
- Simultaneity of emotions: not in all cases the recognition of our emotions is so simple. During the confinement we experienced a little over a year ago, we surely felt a multitude of emotions at the same time: sadness, frustration, anger, etc. Experimenting with all of them at the same time means that we cannot identify them so easily, thus making the regulation process difficult.
Exercises to work on emotional self-awareness
Learning to recognize your own emotions is not an easy task, but it is not impossible either. To achieve this, below, we propose some exercises to work on emotional self-awareness.
Psychoeducation
As we have noted previously, emotions accompany us in our daily lives. However, as with other things, they are something so everyday that, sometimes, it is difficult for us to define them and know exactly what they imply. He theoretical knowledge about our emotions will allow us:
- Know what an emotion is.
- Know its functions.
- Get a guide for correct emotional identification.
- Increase our emotional vocabulary, so that it helps us in the process of labeling our own emotions.
Observation
Another exercise to work on emotional self-awareness consists of observe our state to become aware of it. Self-observation will help us locate where and how we feel emotions, what thoughts the emotions entail or are causing, and what consequences they are having on our behavior.
Labeling emotions
By having documented our emotions, our emotional vocabulary will have been enriched, which will help put a name to what we are feeling. This exercise to work on emotional self-awareness will help us connect with what we are feeling and begin the process of emotional regulation.
While it is true that, sometimes, especially if we are not used to labeling emotions, the task can be complex, especially in situations where several emotions appear simultaneously. In this article, you will find more information about .
Situations
To practice emotional self-awareness, we can think about certain hypothetical situations and what emotions we might experience in those situations. We can also think about situations we have been through and try to remember what emotions we felt in those situations, how and where we felt them.
In the same way, another of the exercises to work on emotional self-awareness that we can do is to do one and remember situations in which we have felt this way.
This article is merely informative, at Psychology-Online we do not have the power to make a diagnosis or recommend a treatment. We invite you to go to a psychologist to treat your particular case.
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References
- Goleman, D. (1998). The practice of emotional intelligence. Barcelona: Kairos.
Bibliography
- Iriarte Redín, C., Alonso-Gancedo, N. and Sobrino, A. (2006). Relationships between emotional and moral development to be taken into account in the educational field: proposal for an intervention program. Electronic Journal of Psychoeducational Research, 4.1 (8), 177-212
- Lane, RD, Quinlan, DM, Schwartz, GE, Walker, PA, & Zeitlin, SB (1990). The Levels of Emotional Awareness Scale: A Cognitive-Developmental Measure of Emotion. Journal of Personality Assessment, 55(1 and 2), 124-134.