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It's not always that people "do not know what their feelings are".
It's that they have destructive feelings or destructive feelings based on inaccuracies or destructive feelings stemming from unfortunate experiences or unfortunate experiences in living. And therapy can often help in sorting out all the destructive feelings or feelings difficult to live with - and help ameliorate difficulties in living.
My emotions work fine. I just don't like being told to talk about them on command with hidden expectations to answer questions just so. If my therapist responded with "Care to point out why you felt that way?", rather than "Don't lie to me; you didn't feel that", we wouldn't be having this discussion.
I actually know a couple people with Asperger's in my Meetup groups. One mentioned it verbatim, another seems that way due to social awkwardness on their part. Then again, unless someone mentions it like that one person did, you can't assume that every quirky person has Asperger's, either.
I know that; the person you replied to may or may not. If anything, therapists do not give answers; they expect you to find the answers yourself. But they still charge you for the privilege; that's what mystifies me.
I respect that you maintain a private demeanor. That is not how these two conditions are diagnosed. I respect that your limited in wishing to comprehend beyond your nose. Yet most "devoid" of recognizing their emotions do suffer in social settings. I can feel anger and not act on it thru poor behavior choices. A person can't know what they don't know. That is the life of someone with asperbergers.
Maybe ranting is overrated if it isn't followed with positive action? It does begin with thinking and then voicing the feeling, though. Anger is optional and can become a bad habit.
Our feelings can alert us to what we need/want. In order to do this in a constructive manner we can combine our decision-making skills .
The Awareness Wheel is an excellent way to combine feelings, thoughts and action to communicate your needs to others.
I don't believe your premise is accurate. This comes across as an insulated rant based on perception but not reality.
WHO puts too much emphasis on verbalizing our emotional state? No one has demanded that I verbalize my emotional state lately. Where are you seeing this?
lol! That's our Mill-Urb; still grinding his axe.
OP, you got a lousy therapist. They're not all like that, not at all. There are so many different therapists out there, following different therapy styles and approaches, based on different psycho-therapeutic philosophies and bodies of research, that the therapy community is very diverse, not all from the same mold as you assume.
So, can we be done with this topic now? No more rant-about-my-lousy-therapy-experience threads? Pretty please??
OP was what, 10 years old when his parents were alarmed enough by his behavior to put him into therapy? I think he may not be viewing things through an accurate historic lens.
It seems like "feelings" are one of the first things little kids are taught, right after letters, shapes, and farm animals. They're basically taught to memorize emotion words like they're taught to memorize shapes. As they get older, they're expected to fluently explain their emotional state, like "I feel ____." Even as adults, people are expected to use emotion words extensively when talking to a significant other.
And let's not forget talk therapy. If you can't rattle off satisfactory answers to the "How did that make you feel?" question (read: the ones the therapist is looking for), he/she will quickly lose respect for you, and will start gaslighting you to bring you in line with his/her "feelings" agenda. Granted, knowing which "feelings word" to use is a good social skill, but it's overemphasized and wrongly taught.
It's definitely an American thing. I don't know of any other culture, Western or non-Western, that puts so much emphasis on "feelings". (I know Denmark and Norway highly value hygge, which approximately translates as "social coziness", having no English equivalent.) And is it just me, but is "talking about feelings" overrated? I mean, we put so much emphasis on how someone feels, that we ignore what he/she does to address a situation that made them feel that way. It's "feel this" and "feel that". And we indoctrinate our kids that "feelings" are the be-all and end-all, and lose actions in the shuffle.
I mean, it's good that we teach people to verbalize their emotional state, but we put too much emphasis on it. How about briefly acknowledging what you're feeling, then finding ways to keep a good feeling or get out of a bad one. Otherwise, it isn't much different from everybody getting a participation trophy.
Thoughts?
It is my understanding that kids are taught to “use your words” to help them not have to express their emotions through hitting, biting, shoving, etc. So in that context, teaching kids to verbalize how they feel seems like a good thing to me.
In other aspects of life, most of us learn NOT to express our feelings too much, too often. You’ve heard or seen these initials, no doubt: TMI, which stand for Too Much Information, and which can be applied to oversharing of feelings. And, most Americans treat the standard greeting of “How are you?” as just that, a greeting not intended to actually find out your feelings or well being.
So, I am not sure I agree with your premise. I do know that some people talk too much about their personal feelings, but they are exceptions, in my experience.
Talking about them consistently with no plan of action to change them isn’t very useful.
Realizing that we cannot change others in order to change our own feelings is impossible. We can only make choices for ourselves and what we will and will not accept.
I have a relative that has done so much wrong over the years to so many around him. He’s been in and out of therapy for most of his life. He calls to apologize but really it’s juat for himself. He does it at times of holidays, etc so he has somewhere to go. The behavior always returns. It’s who he is. I have to not let his actions affect my feelings. Making a decision to keep this from happening was to completely cut him out of my life. That’s how I handled my feelings. And it’s just fine to do that. No more sadness or resentment. There are no feelings now. No affect on my life.
I tell that story as an example. I could just complain and get upset every time that call or text comes. Drone on about how unfair and depressing it is because I know it won’t change. Set myself up for another let down.
There’s a lot of bad and sad out there. There’s also a lot of good. What do you look for? I look for good. Find I’m so much happier now.
Ehhhhh....maybe he did. Not particularly convinced of that. We're not necessarily looking at the most reliable of narrators, here.
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So, can we be done with this topic now? No more rant-about-my-lousy-therapy-experience threads? Pretty please??
I feel like this is a super tall order.
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I mean, we put so much emphasis on how someone feels, that we ignore what he/she does to address a situation that made them feel that way. It's "feel this" and "feel that". And we indoctrinate our kids that "feelings" are the be-all and end-all, and lose actions in the shuffle.
