Idenify Your Own Emotions.

We are all now pretty skilled at communicating at this point in our lives, so why not become an expert at communicating our emotions properly as well? I find that many people have a difficult time communicating their emotions effectively because they cannot identify the root of their emotion. In chapter 7, the concept I found most useful was how to Identify Your Emotions. At times this can require lots of patience in order to sort the puzzle pieces out, but people need to realize it’s the most important part; instead what many people do is lean towards an easy solution, which can also be the worst. For example, if I am hurt by a friend who does not make time for me because of her new boyfriend, I should communicate that to her right when I feel it. Whereas in many cases, friends will tend to put on a front that it doesn’t bother them and they are just “mad” because they spend too much time with their other half. Realizing the root of the emotion, the feeling your experiencing and why, is crucial in communicating efficiently.  When in doubt of your own emotions, take a step back before you speak or show action and think within yourself what you are feeling; give attention to your inner self. Just as the book states, “…we can learn to ignore our feelings, [but we can also] teach ourselves to notice and heed them” (Woods).

Fallacies.

My understanding of a fallacy is it’s an erroneous rational often due to a misconception or presupposition. Our book goes into detail about six distinct fallacies: perfectionism, obsession with should, over-generalization, taking responsibility for others, helplessness, and fear of catastrophic failure. Out of the six and considering my own intrapersonal communication, I would consider perfectionism and taking responsibility for others to tie into my own communication. I am a creature of habit, which can be a good thing and a bad thing. I tend to be OCD when it comes to things and having them my way, thus  perfectionism describes me perfectly at times. However, being unrealistic and having dissatisfaction with myself over time can become life-threatening. I have subconsciously learned to fix this by doing self-talks and learning to deter these negative emotions knowing they have the opportunity to get the best of me. They can be my nemesis, but I fight them off. As for taking responsibility for others, I usually feel I am responsible for what others think about me far too often and feel I am responsible for their feelings. This can be good and bad; good because I believe I am a caring and sensitive person, but bad in a sense that if I always worry about what people think, it can get poisonous.

Emotions. Week of Oct. 1-7

Recognizing that we all are sensitive to different stimuli as individuals, many of which can trigger a roller-coaster of emotions, is half the reason we have different perspectives on emotions. Chapter 7 goes into detail about emotion and communication; it talks about the different perspectives that play a role in our emotional lives. Although I appreciated all of them, the one that made the most sense to me was the physiological influences on emotions or the “organismic view of emotion.” I found this emotion to have the most meaning to me because it related it to the most basic form of an emotion. If you experience a stimulus of some sort, whether it’s a smile or rude gesture, your brain develops a physiologic response to that stimulus. Once you trigger the stimuli, emotion comes into play, causing a physiological change within our bodies—reacting to the stimulus. A time where I have experienced a physiological emotion is when I went a long time without seeing my boyfriend; the moment I reconnected, my stomach had millions of “butterflies” that I just could not explain.