There is absolutely no reason why emotions should be so complicated to identify, handle or communicate. Yet they are. It’s all inter-connected - 1) we don’t know what we are feeling so 2) we don’t know have the vocabulary for what’s going on and therefore 3) we communicate terribly with people around us.
As a 22 year old student in Berlin, I didn’t have the funds to access mental health practitioners - but I had amazing friends. People that shared life experiences and wanted to grow with the people around them. So I’m going to share 2 tools that I learnt from Molly that had a life coach, that they shared with me and now I’m passing on to you.
Emotions wheel
What is an emotions wheel?
It’s a visual aid to help categorise the many emotions that we can feel! It can be used to find the more specific vocabulary to identify exactly what we are feeling. It allows us to get an insight into our inner workings. The more I’ve used it, the more I’ve learnt about myself. Here are questions I ask myself:
Are the base emotions (happy, sad, angry etc in the centre of the wheel) enough to describe what I’m feeling? Are they too broad?
Is there a combination of feelings that I am carrying? Are they contrasting and therefore confusing?
Do I like what I’m feeling? Do I have to like what I’m feeling?
I find that more often than not, I am feeling multiple emotions. It’s confusing and even more difficult to identify when these emotions are contrasting such as proud and infuriated. But they can exist together. Identifying my emotions makes me calmer - there’s less turmoil and chaos inside. At least now I know. You may ask - okay, then what?
Then we go a step further and ask ourselves, what led to these feelings?
I often use the wheel when I’m feeling conflicted - especially when the base emotions are anger, sadness and fear. I don’t question my happy feelings as much or at all. Story time - I met a guy in January of 2022. It was a whirlwind romance at a wedding, right out of Bollywood! He held my hand, danced with me, lent me his jacket, ran to me when a drunk guy tried to kiss me, talked to me all night, told me he liked me, and promised to stay in touch with me after the wedding. Of course he didn’t. Of course it bothered me. I was frustrated enough about it to talk to multiple friends about it over a period of 3 weeks. Molly (virtually) handed me this very emotions wheel and asked me, what are you feeling? Anger. Frustration. Disrespected. How dare he tell me he will stay in touch and then block me?!
In my experience, anger stems from your protective instinct when your values have been compromised, your needs have not been fulfilled or your boundaries have been trashed. So which of the three had happened? I value communication, so blocking me instead of providing an explanation was a value-breach for me.
Fear for me comes from the unknown or insecurities. It’s difficult for my inner control freak to let go and go with the flow, and facing insecurities is vulnerable work. Difficult work. It requires faith.
You may ask, okay I know what value or need or boundaries have been compromised. Now what? Unfortunately, we go another step further and ask:
Now that I have found the combination of words, am I able to communicate them to people around me? Does it help me to ask for space so I can sit with my emotions and take my time to process them?
Non-violent communication (NVC)
NVC is a great tool that breaks down communication into a format. It helps you communicate your boundaries with others without getting aggressive, allocating blame, needing to defend yourself.
Observation: Here, we use language such as “I noticed, I observed, I saw”. For example, I noticed that you used the word XXX when you were doing ZZZZZ.
Feeling: It made me feel/ I felt very (enter emotions from the emotions wheel).
Need: It’s important to me that (boundary) is respected/ I need my friends to (boundary)/ I believe in (boundary).
Request: I would appreciate (behaviour).
These four elements are your structure and format, and they take a ton of practice. In the beginning, I would make drafts in my notes app before sending it via text. I would also send these drafts to my friends first to see if it sounded aggressive at all. The biggest feedback I received in the beginning was to shorten the message and to stop apologising. Eventually, the number of drafts and frequency of needing feedback reduced.
Feel welcome to listen to my random but kinda relevant song recommendation:
By the time I’ve finished writing this newsletter, I had to unfortunately use NVC myself with a (former?) friend. The goal of NVC to me is always to communicate boundaries so they are clear and never get breached again. But at the same time, it is to also communicate within all my relationships safely so that miscommunication can be avoided and friendships can be saved from a downward spiral. I wasn’t able to save this friendship despite using these tools, and sometimes that’s just how it is. All tools can fail despite the best of intentions. I trust them however, because they’ve worked more often than not. I wished him luck instead of making a request.
In the spirit of what my friends had done for me, I am opening up my chats to any of you that want feedback on their drafts of NVC. Send me DMs on Instagram @vedi_vakdi. I also urge you to ask yourself which emotion or set of emotions you feel today. Use the wheel. Tell me or anyone you trust. Try.
Feeling optimistic today,
Vedi
Just what I needed today! Such a comprehensive guide to ease into communication when you are feeling overwhelmed! Thank you for this! <3
Gonna have to start doing this!!!