Understanding differences between EMOTIONS FEELINGS and MOODS | episode 04

how do emotions and feelings work

together

with moods

[Music]

so what's the difference between

emotions feelings and moods

the short answer is time you see

something or hear something or think

something

and you have an almost instantaneous

automatic physiological reaction there's

this

little window of time when these

chemicals of emotions start flooding

into you

and then they start affecting your

different systems and cells

and because emotion chemicals affect

every part of you

from your thinking to all of your

physiology these emotions start to go

into your body and they start to go to

work

and then you start to feel them you

start to have a sensation

just think about that idea that your

emotion chemicals

are regulating every part of your bodily

system

and at some point you start to perceive

them you literally

feel your feelings just in terms of the

difference between feelings

emotions and moods first comes emotion

and then the chemicals start to affect

us and it becomes

feelings and then over time these

multiple different feelings that we have

begin to merge together into a mood

and the mood lasts longer and i'll

explain to you later why this time is so

important

and how we're adapted to have these

short

and longer emotional reactions to help

us survive

and thrive so let's dig in to a bit of

the neuroscience of emotion

now you might have seen some of our

other videos where we really go

into what emotions are made of and how

they work

but i want to just talk in more general

terms about this idea of what emotions

are doing

in our brains and bodies there's some

fascinating work by lisa feldman barrett

where she's suggesting

that actually we're creating our

emotions on the fly

as a kind of emergent property and

there's a whole bunch of neuroscience

researchers who talk about

emergent theories of emotions emergent

what does that mean well i'm a beekeeper

and one of the things that's fascinating

about bees

is that the hives learn they have an

emergent learning process

a bee flies out it finds some

nectar it comes back it does a little

dance

and in that little dance it communicates

with the hive but it's not that the

whole hive now gets the message

a few bees get the message and a few

more bees go out and they find that

little patch of flowers and they come

back and they do a little dance

and they tell some more bees and then

they go out and pretty soon

thousands of bees have this information

it's an emergent learning process the

the hive as a collective

is learning about the environment and

individual bees

are sharing information with other bees

and more and more and more of the bees

learn

this emergent idea of emotions says that

we're constantly producing all of the

emotion chemicals that we need

just in case and we

then have an we notice something and we

say oh i needed that emotion

let me bring out more of it and we have

this emergent status where we're

we're adapting the environment in almost

real time

as these emotion chemicals are helping

to regulate us

and have our thinking and our physiology

work together

with the situation that we're in now of

course this is all based on our

perceptions

there's some incredibly interesting

research

about teaching people who are blind

to see with their tongues they did these

studies where they were creating these

electrode plates and they could put this

electrode plate on a blind person's

tongue

and they could stimulate the production

of certain chemical

signals and in this research they were

able to help blind people

actually be able to see by stimulating

these chemical signals

now just think about that for a second

you look around

you see the lights you see what kind of

day it is you see your flowers on the

table

there's no light in your brain let that

sink in for a second

there's no light in your brain

so everything that you're seeing is

actually a chemical print

a chemical model of the environment

around you you have your perceptions

and they're converted into chemicals

emotions

are also chemicals that help us

understand

our environment so we have we have

chemicals for taste with chemicals for

light

we have chemicals for emotions and all

of them in very similar ways

help us read the situation that we're in

and adapt

in order to survive and thrive that's

the basic physiological function of

emotion

and we're creating these chemicals in

our brains but also

in our bodies especially around our

hearts in our guts and our spines

everywhere candace pert a neuroscientist

who was on one of our advisory board

members

said that it's almost like a second

communication system

we have these long branching cells

that help us carry information between

our brains and bodies

we also have these chemicals of emotion

that carry information

and they're helping us get ready they're

helping us adapt

it's all based on what we're perceiving

because there's no light in our brain

it's not about what's real it's about

how we're perceiving the world

inside us and around us and these

emotion signals

are happening even if we're unconscious

of them you can be somebody who says i

don't believe in all this emotion mumbo

jumbo

and guess what that was emotion that was

triggering that thought it's actually

emotion that's triggering

what you believe is true and untrue it's

emotion that's deciding

what you perceive as important or not

important and that's happening at a

foundational physiological level

whether you pay attention to it or not

whether you believe in it or not science

doesn't care but what's interesting

about emotions

is that when you do pay attention to

them you can become more accurate

and clear and this data starts to make

more sense

and this is really important as we move

to the next step

and we start paying attention to what

feelings are

and what feelings are telling us

there's so many interesting things about

feelings

so you remember the idea is that

emotions are released these chemicals

are produced all of our brains and

bodies and then these chemicals start

running around

changing our physiology changing our

thinking literally

all of our bodily systems uh one time my

uncle

uh dr will evans and i were talking

about this and he said it's interesting

how in all of our physiological systems

our blood system our breathing our

endocrine system

when those things get blocked or they're

not flowing properly

we have a problem and chinese medicine

talks about this too the flow of energy

in our bodies

and when it's blocked there's a problem

what if the

same thing is true with our emotion

systems what if the natural healthy

state of our emotions is to flow

i remember when my children were babies

and they would get

really angry and their bodies would turn

red the emotions released

they starts affecting everything in

their bodies their capillaries are

expanding so they turn red

and that feeling is washing through them

and then like a storm in the summertime

blowing out and it's done

now that is a flowing state of feelings

when the emotion starts to go to work in

us all of these bodily systems

start to be affected we have this really

cool thing called a bio dot

and we use it for teaching about

feelings because

when you put a bio dot on your hand it

starts to change

temperature based on your emotional

state

why would that happen well because when

you're a little bit stressed

your capillaries at your extremities

start to close down

to keep more blood in your trunk you

don't even have to notice that you're

stressed for this to happen

there's an amazing tool called a heart

rate variability monitor

and your your heart rate is not actually

consistent

your heart rate

you might not even notice it unless

you're going to a really extreme level

of

arrhythmia and then you better go to the

hospital

uh in our daily lives the rhythm of our

heart is actually

changing not just the frequency but how

consistent it is

the variability of the heart rate and

there's a lot of

work by our friends at heartmath where

they've been studying how our feelings

are changing

the variability of our heart rate and

just by

breathing deeply and actively doing some

appreciation

and practicing a state of being in the

zone

we can actually make our hearts beat

more evenly which is correlated with the

physiological state of readiness and

openness

it's when the bio dot's turning green

and we're in a place where we're in an

optimal state for thinking and learning

and growth and adapting

so this physiological signal it's very

subtle it's automatically happening our

skin temperature

our heart rate and of course our

thinking

when we are feeling fear

not just the emotion but it starts to

work in us and we might feel a little

tremble we might feel that little tremor

in our voice

what it's doing to our thinking is it's

saying hey pay attention there's a risk

when we're excited and you can feel your

heart beating

and your breathing becomes a little more

shallow interestingly it's quite a lot

like the physiological response to

stress

it's our body saying to us hey there's

some possibility here

take a look at it there's actually some

great research on stress

and how this physiological reaction to

stress and the physiological reaction to

excitement are

so similar kelly mcgonagall wrote a

whole book about this the upside of

stress

and we have a great article on our

website but what she said is that

because the physiological signals of

stress and excitement are so

similar if we simply shift our thinking

when we feel stressed we say what's

exciting me in this situation

and she reports research in her book

that says that people who have

heart disease who just make that one

little shift

they have 30 percent less chance of

dying from the heart disease

so we're talking about an important

interconnection

between our physiology and our emotions

and that's what feelings are

feelings are the bridge between the raw

emotion

and the physiological and cognitive

experience because remember

our brains are part of our bodies too so

our emotions

as they start to go to work on all these

different cells they're affecting

every system including our thinking

systems

when it comes to feelings one of the big

myths

is about positive and negative feelings

you know people say

i want to have more positive feeling and

what they mean by that is they want to

have more feelings like excitement and

joy

of course those feelings aren't

appropriate all the time and they're not

even useful all the time

happiness is wonderful but it turns out

sorrow is pretty wonderful too

when you're losing someone or you're in

a difficult circumstance

you know we need to use the right

feeling for the situation

that we're in now in one of our other

videos we talked about the plutchik

model

which is a fantastic structure for

looking at different emotions

and feelings but i also want to share

something that we call

the feeling log and in my book at the

heart of leadership we talk all about

the feeling log

and how to use it as a manager it's a

really simple model

and mark bracket from yale uses this

in his work with emotions he calls it

the mood meter

the feeling log is just two axes how

intense is the feeling

whoa it's really intense or

so intense and on the other axis how

pleasant is it

oh this feels great or this is difficult

and we don't need to be in judgment that

one of those is good or bad in fact you

have four quadrants

and each of the quadrants does something

different

when you're in that top left quadrant

that tells you there's a big problem

when you're in the bottom left quadrant

it's a small problem and it's causing

you to focus

to pay attention to little errors and

here's an interesting fact from peter

salovey

the one of the original scientists who

discovered emotional intelligence

together with his colleague jack mayer

peter says

that you are actually more accurate at

computational tasks when you're in that

slightly

uh unpleasant mood when you're in that

quadrant too

quadrant three is about recovery and

rest

it's about openness it's about readiness

for what's next

and quadrant four is about giving you

energy to move forward and take risks

and try things

now any of you who are parents will know

sometimes people are in quadrant four

especially little people bouncing off

the walls and you say hey it's time to

calm down a little bit

so in other words you don't think

quadrant four is all that positive when

it's bedtime

or i used to be a middle school teacher

and when my middle school students were

in quadrant four

sometimes i'd say okay let's take a

moment and do some breathing because we

need to come back

down to quadrant three or even shift

over to quadrant two

so we can do a better job learning and

if you're somebody who's dealing with

significant crisis or challenge you

might actually want to be and want your

people to be in quadrant one

to confront the intensity of the

challenge so here's a little exercise

for you

we'll put the notes in the description

of the video

so you can download a worksheet for this

and some more instructions

but i just want you to take a moment and

notice

how intense is the feeling you're in

right now

and if it's a really low level of

intensity you know maybe it's down at a

zero

or one or it could be kind of in the

middle or

could be wow it's really sizzling strong

intensity feeling up at the top

and how pleasant is it is it something

that you're struggling with or grappling

with or having a hard time with

it's over in quadrant one or two if it's

something that

feels pleasant and fun and engaging and

wants you to move forward

it's in quadrant three or four so just

take a moment and don't even name the

feeling

just draw that little diagram and put

your finger where your feelings are now

and then consider quadrant one big

problems

pay attention quadrant two these

feelings are telling you

small challenges focus in quadrant three

recover relax take a break

quadrant four let's go

so in other words our feelings are

causing us

to narrow our attention towards problems

or expand our attention towards

opportunities

and our feelings are motivating us to

move forward

or move back now as we start to get

more and more of these different feeling

states and remember i mentioned lisa

feldman barrett's research

that we have all of these different

feelings at the same time

and in six seconds we always say you

have more than one feeling at a time

what's beneath that feeling so you have

that one feeling that you're noticing

maybe that's like the loud voice calling

for attention

but there are other quieter feelings

that might be hiding in the background

and as you look beneath that first

feeling and we actually have a video

about this about my favorite

question for coaching and looking at the

emotions

you start to notice the feelings that

might be hiding in the background

and you can actually on this four

quadrant you can actually graph a whole

bunch of different feelings

and notice your state right now it's

important to get clear on your feelings

before we go into moods

because moods can be really confusing

they're more generalized

and they're a mixture a lot of different

feeling data

that's going to kind of flow together

into this new state

physical mental emotional state

or condition that we're going to

experience as a mood

a mood is a semi-persistent mixture

of emotional physical and cognitive

state

in other words it's got some thinking

it's got some feeling

and it's got some physiology why do we

have moods

well if you think about a situation

where you're in a

stressful circumstance and maybe you're

in a conflict with somebody

there's a very good chance that that's

not just going to get resolved in a few

seconds

and as you've learned in some of our

other videos emotions are actually

only last for a short period of time so

the purpose of a mood

is to help us stay ready

for what might be coming next and this

is why

the mood that we're in changes what we

perceive

and we actually start to pick up signals

that match the mood that we're in it's

because if you're in a

let's just say anxious mood it means

that

there's a generalized sense of threat

you're not exactly sure what the problem

is

but there might be something out there

that you need to pay attention to

there's some danger lurking and so you

have this mood that actually is designed

by evolution to help you pay attention

to these potential risks

and it causes you to notice more things

that are risky

so our our moods are basically a way of

generalizing the feeling state over a

longer period of time

what's interesting about this remember

the emotion is very specific

we perceive something and we have this

almost instantaneous

emotional reaction and then these

chemicals start to work in our brains

and bodies

they start changing our systems and we

start to feel our feelings

and then over time we have more and more

of these things coming together

into what we call a mood this means that

the mood is both longer lasting

and more general it's a way for us to

sense and pick up and adapt to the

environment

around us as well as the environment

inside us

and that's why other people's feelings

have a big impact on our mood

the lighting affects our mood what we

eat

what you ate yesterday affects your mood

today

there's some intriguing research where

they fed rats

probiotic foods and then a day later

they put them into a test

and they saw that the rats who ate the

probiotic yogurt

were less volatile and reactive than the

rats who didn't so that means that the

emotional reaction

might be automatic but we are setting

the conditions

in which that automatic reaction takes

place

this is why things like exercise and

diet and getting good sleep are actually

an important part of our mental health

because we're setting up the conditions

in which their reactions are going to

happen tomorrow or the next day or the

next day

so your choices today are setting up the

state that you're going to be in

when you come into a situation in the

future

you need to assess your mood and the

situation

because moods are generalized we often

have a mood that we've been carrying

forward from the past

and it may no longer be useful to us

just for example let's say we had a lot

of conflict yesterday

and we were in a really agitated

stressed anxious mood

as a result of that and we didn't do

anything to change it and we could wake

up today and we're still

in that agitated stressed mood maybe

even more because we didn't sleep very

well

maybe we didn't go and do any exercise

maybe we didn't have a good meal

we wake up in the morning and now we're

already predisposed

to have more of this anxious volatility

that's useful if we're continuing to be

in an anxious and volatile situation

and we need to watch out for threats and

and be protective

but what if we actually want to be in a

different situation today

what if we are in a different

circumstance or with different people

or we're trying to create some change

moods have this persistency effect

that's useful

if you're in the same conditions but if

you want to change

the mood can become an obstacle for

creating the change that you're looking

for today

and so it's important to notice the mood

and then to do the work to change it

and it's actually not that hard to

change your mood because there's so many

different

variables that are affect our mood

sometimes just reading a cartoon

talking to somebody writing journaling

going for a run doing a little bit of

exercise

eating some probiotic yogurt being out

in the sun

stretching all of these things can start

to shift our mood

we can think about it like a paint box

you know and we put in a bunch of

colors yesterday and you know and the

picture is looking like this

but if we want to change that we can

start adding a little bit of a new color

and then a little bit of a new one a

little bit of a new one and pretty soon

we have a very different picture

we have a very different context in

which we're noticing emotional data

and using that data to help us adapt to

the world that's inside us

and around us so to recap what's the

difference between

emotions feelings and moods

the simple answer is time but you've

learned a lot more about the physiology

of emotions

and how emotions are automatically

produced almost instantaneously

and then they start to go to work on our

brains and bodies and we

we feel them they change our thinking

they change our physiology

and as these changes start to mount up

over time

they become moods a more generalized

state

that's going to last a little bit longer

interestingly in all three parts there

are different emotional intelligence

strategies that you can use for example

in the first stage with emotions it's

noticing this data these quickly

fleeting signals you only have

this little six second window of

opportunity to pay attention and say hey

something's happening here

and then as we get into feelings and

noticing these different feeling states

happening

being able to name them and understand

them i feel this because

and i also feel this and i also feel

this

and not just staying on the surface

level but looking at what's underneath

and then when we get to moods taking

responsibility for the mood that we're

in

is this a mood that's really going to

help me and doing those simple things

that can help us shift our mood

so that we create the conditions for the

emotional reactions that are actually

going to help us

and that's how we use emotional

intelligence in our daily lives

to prepare ourselves for what's to come

to to notice this data and to get the

meaning from it so we can solve the

challenges that are in front of us

hi i'm josh friedman thanks for watching

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