Emotions are complex, with many dimensions. We have found that representing certain of the elements of emotions in a visual way can help many people clarify their thinking and decisions.
In particular the dimension of 'bodily arousal-bodily quiescence,' and the dimension of 'nice-nasty' (i.e. pleasure-pain) are especially valuable in the context of people wanting to change their lives.
Everyone is familiar with active and passive, nice and nasty experiences. So regarding arousal-quiescence (bodily aroused/bodily quiet) as the north-south on an emotional world map, and nice(positive)/nasty(negative) as the east-west, we can draw a diagram or map so:
It is important to remember at this point that nice-nasty (or pleasure-pain, or positive-negative) are NOT equivalent to good-bad, or to appropriate-inappropriate. Both nice and nasty feelings can be very useful: as rewards for, or goads to, action for instance.
An extension of this basic map comes from noting the strong connections between places on the feelings-map and STATES OF ATTENTION or awareness. A map of various attentional states seems to look like this:
The significance of this extension to the feelings-map is that it clarifies the quite different states of attention which occur during nice, as compared to nasty, feeling states. Ignoring the extreme highs and lows of arousal, the following applies at all arousal levels:
Such differences are very functional in everyday living. Thus short term hazards typically evoke negative emotions such as fear and anger. During such emotions attention will be trapped by the threatening situation. When you are fleeing that bad tempered dog for instance, this is fine. To spend time noticing that your shoes are dirty, or how pretty Mrs. Jones' garden is, would be an expensive luxury indeed. Once escaped from Fido however you will feel pleased with yourself. In this positive state your focus of attention broadens. With more Free Attention the situation can be thought about: you could notice and remember that the dog always barks before she starts chasing you; you could plan to go a different route and avoid the dog completely.
Negative feelings reduce attention in two ways; the arousal that accompanies them takes attention, and the preoccupation with the threatening stimuli take attention. (#4). This cannot be voluntarily altered, which is why we talk about Trapped Attention. An individual's span of attention is limited, so inappropriate negative feelings, by reducing available attention, impair efficiency in any task. Another characteristic of awareness, implicit in the above, and important in co-counselling, is the fact that our attention may be divided. Thus you can be aware of a distressing event that has just occurred and the fact that you are now quite safe. Such a BALANCE OF ATTENTION between distress and present safety is represented on the feelings-map as follows:
At this point it's possible to ask: how can the more COMPLEX EMOTIONS be represented on the emotional space of the feelings map? After all it is mostly the more complex emotions, and their expression, for which our language provides words. As an illustration of this, consider a few words used to label some varied emotional experiences: ecstatic, cross, gloomy, peaceful. Though such complex emotions cannot be adequately pictured with the simple image of the feelings-map, certain aspects of each emotion can be represented, so:
Ideas such as these four emotion-words are acquired along with the rest of our language; usually in a language-using family belonging to a language-using species. In the northwest, ecstatic, quadrant one would feel bouncy, gleeful, marvellous; one would deal with everything well. In the northeast, cross, quadrant one would feel tense and irritable. Blood pressure would be high, and thoughts would go round and round. In the southwest, peaceful, quadrant one would feel relaxed and quietly pleasant, with all sorts of new ideas popping up. In the southeast, gloomy, quadrant one would feel droopy and miserable, lack energy, and be unable to think of anything else. Bodily feelings are perhaps less linguistic, though how much less is not clear. Given the infinite variety of personal biography, each of us has our own, personal emotional space, and will map emotion-words differently.
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