Posted by Dinah on January 2, 2009, at 16:26:43
In reply to Describing feelings: shape, color, smell, taste..., posted by workinprogress on January 2, 2009, at 12:57:36
I'm impressed with your therapist. I tried to explain things in those terms to my therapist, and he thought it was odd of me.
When I first started really feeling again, I could really only think of it in colors. I made a very detailed color wheel of emotions with the 64 crayola crayon set. Then I made a corresponding emotion word chart. So that if I felt the brownish red of brick, I could look it up and realize that I was feeling resentment. My therapist had that at the front of my chart until the agency closed.
Even now, when I'm at my most emotional self I tend to think in terms of colors, or images, or movements. I describe my feelings with arm gestures and limited vocabulary and my therapist tries to help me put words to them.
To me, the only way to describe my daddy when he was angry was ominously thick black with flashes of red. Or my husband as a pillar of crackling electricity shooting off occasional sparks. Or my mother as a volcano, erupting gobs of anger everywhere. I still don't think there are proper words for those things.
Still, my therapist obviously doesn't think that way. So it makes sense that some people do, and some don't. If you don't, I would think it is fair enough to tell your therapist that that just isn't your experience. We're probably all wired a bit differently.
poster:Dinah
thread:871936
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20081219/msgs/871957.html