How to Understand Our Emotions - YLAM230002

SPEAKER A This programme presents ways to optimise health and wellbeing when considering lifestyle changes. Please consult with your health care provider to ensure they are suitable for you. SPEAKER B Hello and welcome. I'm Kaysie Vokurka. Would you like to understand your emotions better? Emotions are quite complex and can be challenging to know what they mean. Our topic today is how to understand our emotions. SPEAKER A This is your lifestyle as medicine, a production of 3ABN Australia television. SPEAKER B On this programme, we explore ways that you can shape your lifestyle as medicine. Today, we are continuing our discussion on an important aspect of our emotions. Once again, I'm joined by health psychologist Jenifer Skues. Welcome, Jenifer. SPEAKER C Thank you. SPEAKER B So good to have you again. We really appreciated talking with you in the last session and today we are going to continue with our discussion and we are focusing on how to understand our emotions. And I want to ask you, how important is it for us to understand our emotions? SPEAKER C We need to understand our emotions so we can have some sort of control over them, because emotions can be very self destructive, our emotions can drive us to also be destructive to other people. For example, if we feel angry, we're likely to say something inappropriate. If we're feeling angry with ourselves, we're likely to harm ourselves in some way. So emotions are very powerful in not just what we are like internally, but how we treat ourself and how we treat others. SPEAKER B Yeah, that sounds like it's very important for, like, it's not just important for us, it's important for our relationships. And almost everything we do in life has a bearing on whether we can manage or recognise and manage our emotions. SPEAKER C Absolutely, yeah. SPEAKER B Do emotions have anything to do with our intelligence? SPEAKER C They have everything to do with our intelligence, because we can be intelligent in two ways. And there is a slide I sent you. That's it. IQ versus Eq. IQ, which is the top of that iceberg, is our intelligent quotient, whereas Eq is our emotional quotient. So let's look at IQ. That is the one people are very familiar with, because people value the IQ. So if you are in academia, it is based on IQ, not EQ, it's the intelligence we have. People often look at themselves, I've got a high IQ, a low IQ, an average IQ, and they value themselves on the IQ. And it was never meant to be that way. When IQ was developed, the assessment of it was to help children be educated. So it's actually assessing children's capacity to learn and to grow. Therefore they measured it with this intelligence quotient, which is really mathematical processing. It's more to do with. We talked about the left brain functioning, that cognitive side, where we can process, make sense of things, think in linear terms, okay? But they don't. It doesn't take into account our emotions. It only looks at our capacity to function on that level. So we've overvalued the IQ, which, as you can see from that iceberg, is actually a very small part. If you have a look at that on our actual IQ, the rest of it is driven or underpinned by the huge mountain of our emotional quotient. It actually connects to and drives the IQ. Now, the IQ is, there's a genetic component that we inherit that says with our iq that we can actually develop it, we could enhance it, we can improve it, or we can actually modify it in the wrong way. And they find that with children, particularly now, there are so many children who live on junk food, don't get nutrients, it actually impairs the IQ. Emotional trauma can impair the IQ. So we can damage or enhance the IQ, even though there's a genetic component. SPEAKER B That's interesting, because that sounds to me a lot like the study of epigenetics, which has been around for the last decade, where they've found that what we do in our life and our experience affects how we can function. Even if we have either a good genetic head start or one that's got some parts that are going to set us off on a step back. What we do with our lifestyle can make a difference, can't it? SPEAKER C Oh, it can. And what we think, and we're going to talk about negative and positive emotions and thoughts and things at some point, but what we think turns on or turns off genes. So if we think positively, we protect the gene pool. If we think negatively, we actually can turn on the weak genes, what we've inherited. So that is a powerful process. And this is where, I guess, your IQ EQ is relevant in having that balance and having a good eQ, not just developing the iq. So if you have a look at emotional quotient, have you ever been told to grow up, to get a life, to change the way you feel? And people don't realise we have emotional intelligence and it can be measured. And that emotional intelligence, they're saying, does have a genetic component, but generally it is based on the development. So we do inherit aspects of feelings and our emotions, but what we do with it when we are born, it is dependent on our models, on our society, on our belief systems, whether it be social, spiritual, any of those, our education system, our emotional intelligence, or what we call maturity is relevant to that and it's dependent on that. So we need to, because I find the people that I see in my private practise, I find often have a good iq, but they don't have a good eQ. And this is where trauma, for example, will packed the emotional quotient or intelligence and inhibit it. And that's at a very young age. From zero to two is when that is set, because a baby, when it is born, it has the emotional brain and the survival part of the brain. And I mean, we talked about the different aspects of the emotional brain is in play, but your thinking brain doesn't come into play until you're around two years of age. And that is when children start to be able to talk more, think things through. It's when they're gonna challenge life, challenge parents, the terrible twos, they often call it. And that's because the brain is now developing. But everything they programme from birth through to that development is in the emotional memory bank. And we don't. You know, how far back can people remember? Sometimes they can go back a lot further than two, maybe 18 months because of maybe something had happened in their life. For example, a lady I knew, she said, oh, I can remember I was about 18 months when we came out from England to Australia and I can remember being on the boat. So it's a significant event that might bring it about. But generally it's. Most of our memories are after two. Now, in that zero to two, the emotional development and capacity to regulate your emotions is dependent on your connection with your primary caregiver for most people is the mother. But whoever the surrogate mother is, that's also very, very important. And if that parent or that person who's the main feeder caregiver is stable and they are able to help the child when they. To regulate emotions. For example, if the child is crying, that that mother or that caregiver, sometimes dad are caregivers now recognise the child's cries because they're wet, they're hungry, they're distressed, so they need to respond appropriately. And if they miss the mark and they do like the physical side and the child's still distressed, they need to comfort and help that child to calm down. Now, the brain is learning to regulate emotions, even pre two. It's dependent on what we call secure attachment. So if the secure attachment isn't there and the child is calmed and helped develop emotionally, it becomes insecure. And that's where at two years of age, as that thinking brain develops now, the personality starts coming into play. If they're not secure, the brain will start develop emotions that are very controlled or control disorders like anxiety, obsessive compulsive disorder, and they can do that bipolar effect, they can go from that to the brain going into emotional chaos. So this is where trauma or lack of that connection, secure connection, determines then our emotional pathway, how secure it is and how the brain is going to develop, which most people don't know. SPEAKER B Yeah, that's so incredible, because that really highlights how foundational that first two years of life is for an individual. You know, it's really setting them up for the appropriate balance in terms of their emotions and how they're going to operate once they're older. SPEAKER C Absolutely. And this is where the emotional intelligence develops. But if they haven't done that, how often do you hear adults will talk in baby talk or talk like the child, or do childlike things because they're still stuck in that emotion and they don't realise that it's not relevant to being an adult. And they've still got, they've got the adult brain of the IQ, but the EQ is still at a younger age, so that's where we need to do the work. Now, the good news is that as you go through life and you get either therapy or you become aware of it, or you become securely attached to an important person in your life, who you trust is consistent, giving you security, then the brain will develop rapidly and that EQ will develop. SPEAKER B Wow. SPEAKER C Okay. So even a therapist can do that. Someone that the person trusts and respects and would actually find a very good model. So part of the work I do is help people. One, when I do the first session, is help them feel safe and secure and that they can trust me and I can help them. And then we have a working therapeutic relationship where that person can grow emotionally because they feel safe. Yeah. SPEAKER B So what I'm hearing then is all of us have as a basic need for some sort of stability or a stable figure that's giving care in our life. If we don't have it as a child at the start, we still need it somehow. And until that's met, we cannot properly develop and grow to be the complete, well functioning person that we have the potential for. SPEAKER C That's correct. And that is as soon as we have someone in our life that helps us to develop emotionally, then the proportion of your iq and your EQ, as in that iceberg model, actually takes. It's right, it's like an equation. And you can then function well intelligently because your emotions are stable. And then if you step out of that and something happens where it destabilises because you are now more stable, you think, hang on, I'm out of order here, I'm not feeling good. You can actually become self aware and self regulate, because the problem is when you're in trauma and the brain, Eq, hasn't developed, you can't self regulate emotions. So that's one of the things. There are some very good programmes around to help that, and that's something I do, is how can that person learn to regulate emotionally and recognise that their emotions are out of order because they're so used to being that way. And the brain, it's huge stress, you've got a lot of stress hormones. A lot of those people who are in that position emotionally run on adrenaline and cortisol and they actually become quite addicted to it. So to get them to get off of that addiction of it's okay, you don't need a drama in your life, you can actually function without it is a huge undertaking and a huge step. SPEAKER B Wow. So it's quite a process to adapt to a better way of operating, especially if they've gotten into a habit or a pattern of operating in, I guess, the less than ideal way, with the emotions being more dominant or taking over control, because they haven't experienced putting that proper regulatory process in there. SPEAKER C This is where self awareness comes into it. And this is where I find people I work with have a spiritual component and connect with God, or have the working of the Holy Spirit, which comes back to that conscience and the will. Then I find progress a lot quicker because they're not battling it on their own, they have that connection and it's a positive connection. So this is where I find working with people on what they believe spiritually is very powerful in that emotional development as well. There's a lot you can do and a lot people can do. Self awareness is a huge factor. So getting them to connect, how am I really feeling? SPEAKER B So it's very interesting because it is true. Some people will be extremely aware of what they're feeling and their emotions, and they might even appear to live in their emotions all the time. And then other people, if you ask them how they feel, they would have absolutely no idea and they wouldn't be able to tell you whether they're feeling sad or glad or angry or what it is going on. And so how do people develop that awareness of what they're actually experiencing as an emotion? SPEAKER C There's, I guess, different variables there, because when you've had trauma, you tend to suppress, you don't want to feel that way. The conscious mind doesn't sound, suppress emotions, and we can actually end up becoming what we call dissociated emotionally. And this is where I find people with trauma can talk a lot about the trauma in factual terms, the IQ, but when it comes to emotions, they've shut it down. And I've had people say, why don't I feel angry? And eventually, as we do the work, their anger develops because it is there and this is where it affects all of our health when we sit on these powerful emotions. So that self awareness and teaching people what do you think is an appropriate reaction to something like that? And they'll go, anger or pain? I said, yes, and you would have felt it. So we can actually talk about it and develop an awareness. And maybe again, working in the present, what is it that irritates you in the present? And they'll soon find something and then we can work with developing an emotional sequence or where they go, oh, that's what that is. SPEAKER B Yeah. SPEAKER C I find anxious people are interesting because they don't identify their anxiety and they come across as. Well they do, but they come across as angry. And I've said to people, you seem so angry. And they say, no, I'm just anxious. But anger and anxiety are connected. So people see anxious people as angry people. This is where emotions get confused. So you can see how the actual play out of emotions is intended on the interpreter. How do you interpret someone's emotions? How do you identify them? And we misinterpret, often we misinterpret how much we think someone's having a go at us when they're not. So this is where, for the person who's on the receiving end has to work with their emotions as well. And if they're very sensitive, they have to then learn to regulate that. So it's a constant focus. SPEAKER B Yeah, that's very interesting. So I'm wondering, are emotions in and of themselves good or bad, or are they more just neutral and we have to deal with them? SPEAKER C I think emotions are wonderful. Wouldn't life be miserable without emotions? Life would be terrible. I mean, I think God gives us emotions. He wants us to be joyful and happy, and I don't believe he gave us those negative emotions. That's something that has developed, certainly, as we understand, since Adam and Eve and the fall, we've developed these negativities because that was when guilt and shame and all these other emotions connected. So it's really the brain has developed the wrong way, but we can rewire it the right way. And this is where, again, a spiritual focus is very powerful. But what we think in the terms we think because thoughts feed the feelings. You know, we talked about that before. So what you think is powerful in what you're going to feel. SPEAKER B Indeed, yeah. And so it's interesting because, like, obviously we realise the reality that we have more positive emotions and we also have negative emotions. Is there an ideal balance between those, like, or should we be trying to cultivate always having more positive emotions? SPEAKER C Okay, I think we need to develop maybe a more positive emotional run, even if things are going against us. You know, I find I used to get angry about certain things. Now I laugh. I've learned to laugh at myself or laugh at a mistake. And that brings about joy instead of being angry and beating myself up. And again, it's the way I think. So that's just a simple example of how we can learn to interpret emotions versus bury ourselves in them, which, again, is very powerful. So how we do that is a learned skill, because what do you learn about emotions when you're growing up? I mean, what are the parents like if they're angry with each other and non communicative and you're living in that, or if they're joyful, connected parents who work well together? That's how a lot of children can develop in a healthy way. So some of it is. What's the balance? The balance has to be that if we recognise we're being negative emotionally or feeling a negative emotion, what are we going to do with it? Are we going to feed it or are we going to starve it? That is the principle. So I choose to starve it, not feed it, because I learned to feed it. That was my formative years. SPEAKER B Wow. Yeah. And so then, as you've gone throughout, you've obviously learned a lot through your professional experience and personal experience. And you've seen that as you do this, you know, as you focus on the emotions that you want to experience more, it's kind of like a plant that you're watering and it grows more and you experience it more. Would that be somewhat like what it is? SPEAKER C Ah, definitely. Because the brain is. Has neuroplastic factor, and neuroplasticity is like plasticine or clay that can be moulded. And the two areas in the brain that we've talked about that last session is the hippocampus and the amygdala. That's where the actual growth of cells occurs. And so this is where if we're fed fear, the amygdala will grow in fear, it can actually enlarge the amygdala, which is interesting. So it can become bigger in growth, but it's the wrong content, but we can make cells. There's that diagram. You can see the amygdala, the hippocampus, and it's how the thalamus that absorbs it and how it. Where it sends it is very powerful in how we react emotionally and in that actual growth, that cell growth. So we want to be making new cells constantly. And there are lots of good things. Again, this is where nutrition comes into it. But also we can grow cells by our lifestyle habits. Exercise, sunshine, all these things we do. And the principles we have can really help the brain to grow. And particularly in the morning, they find exercise is incredibly powerful in growing the brain. We want more and more cells available to work with, to reprogram the brain, particularly emotionally. So, again, there are very good studies on that that show people who exercise either at work or are more productive children at school perform better, cope better. So the brain even works emotionally with something like exercise can improve your wellbeing emotionally. SPEAKER B That's so interesting. So if I understand you correctly, that, to me, is that when we have new cells being generated, it's kind of like a clean slate. And we could probably more easily direct them into the way we want them to go, as opposed to working with the old cells that have already been bent a certain way, and we want them to go a different way. That might be a bit more of a difficult process. SPEAKER C Well, and consider to use it or lose it. So if we stop acting on the old programming and we develop all these new cells that we put in productively, then what will happen is we start to lose the intensity of that programming. So instead of going on the negative emotional bandwagon, we can go on the positive. We redirect the brain in the way we think or interpret. Okay? And that becomes, it's like any habit. If you want to change a habit, you've got to put effort in, you've got to recognise what you want to change, you have to put effort in. You keep doing it, practising it, and it'll change. And I believe we do this till the day we die. We can always change something, because, unfortunately, we have a lot of negatives that we've programmed in all of us, to some degree, particularly when you look at all the traumas we've been through in the last few years, a lot of fear factors, people of majority of people have responded to. So this is where the work of the brain and emotions is a work in progress. It also connects to hormones. So every thought has a cascade of hormones, which is most interesting. And there's one researcher that talked about molecules of emotion, that when you have a thought, an emotion in the brain, it attaches to cells and goes through the whole system. SPEAKER B Wow. SPEAKER C So it's not just the brain, it's the whole system that is emotionally focused, it's emotional chemicals. SPEAKER B That's so interesting, because that is very much supporting the importance of taking a whole person approach. Because if you have a thought which is creating emotion, which is then affecting every cell in the body with the effects of that emotion and the play out of that, then if it's something that's more like negative, I guess it can also be more disease promoting. And then really the root is stemming all the way back to the thoughts and the emotions. When you might be experiencing something that at first glance is physical. SPEAKER C What happens is, for every thought, a negative thought resonates to every cell of the body negatively. A positive thought uplifts all the chemical balance. It promotes good chemicals, whereas a negative thought promotes the drop in chemicals and damages the cells, every cell in the body, not just one, every one of them, because the bloodstream carries all that, those molecules of emotion, around the whole system. SPEAKER B That is incredible. That is so amazing. And I guess that highlights, I mean, we recognise today there is a lot of difficulty with people struggling with mental and emotional things like depression, anxiety. It's very, very prevalent, especially in western countries. And I guess it really highlights how critical it is for us to address some of these root causes in the thoughts and emotions because of the play out on our overall health. SPEAKER C Yes, it certainly is. So this is where the way we think, how we interact with people, we can reprogram the brain. Sorry for the better, or we go the other way. SPEAKER B Indeed, yeah. So are there any other things to mention just before we finish off for today that would give us just an idea of how to better understand our emotions? SPEAKER C I think we're going to tackle some of these models and topics in the next session, where we're going to start looking at what happens in our past, the present and the future. And that is going to give us a way of how do I deal with my emotions in the present. It gives us a lot of good information. Remember, if the brain understands itself, it works a lot smarter. SPEAKER B Yeah, that's good to know. And that's why we're here, learning from what you have to share about how our brains work so that we can better know how to work with them to improve our overall health and wellbeing and in turn live better lives. So thank you so much for being with us once again Jenifer really appreciate you sharing with us and look forward to speaking with you again next time. Often we first need to understand something well before we can use it well and this is true for our emotions. I hope youve been able to deepen your understanding of emotions as much as I have from our discussion with health psychologist Jenifer Skues. In the next couple of episodes we will talk about using and managing our emotions as we explore the subject of emotional balance. You won’t want to miss this. If you have questions or comments about this programme or if there is a topic you would like us to discuss then contact us on [email protected] and remember to shape your lifestyle as medicine. SPEAKER A You've been listening to Your Lifestyle as Medicine, a production of 3ABN Australia television.