Naming Your Emotions

10 p.m. On the couch, TV on. Nothing in particular has happened today.

Out of nowhere, the back of my neck went hot. What is this, I thought. A craving? No. Am I angry? No. What is it.

I scanned my head. Something was there. I couldn’t put a word to it. Whatever it was kept getting bigger. Before I knew it, I was putting my shoes on. Walking toward the casino.

On the way back, I kept trying to figure out what I’d been feeling. I never did land on it that night.

A few weeks later, on a similar night, a word showed up. “Oh, that was loneliness.” The moment it had a name, it got smaller. That night, I didn’t put my shoes on.

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”I don’t know how I feel” and addiction

A lot of people with gambling addiction struggle to put emotions into words. This isn’t a personality problem. It’s about how addicted brains work, and often, about the environment you grew up in.

A brain that stopped using feelings

Gambling happens inside strong stimulation. Sound, lights, the swings of win and loss, hours lost to focus. There’s no need for fine-grained feelings in that state. The stimulation paints over everything.

Do this for years, and the circuits for sensing and naming fine-grained feelings fall out of use. The brain weakens what it doesn’t use. The result: “I don’t know how I feel.”

People who can’t feel it, act it out

If you can’t put a feeling into words, where does the feeling go? It goes into behavior.

Someone who can’t name “lonely” translates loneliness into “I want to gamble.” Someone who can’t name “sad” translates sadness into “I want a drink.” Someone who can’t name “angry” translates anger into snapping at family.

People who can put a feeling into words often don’t have to act it out. For people who can’t, feelings become actions.

This is why naming emotions is a core part of recovery.

Naming a feeling makes it smaller

Brain imaging studies show this, and I’ll leave the technical version out.

When you say in your head “I’m angry right now,” the intensity of the anger drops a little. When you say “I’m lonely right now,” the loneliness gets smaller.

The part of the brain that generates feelings and the part that handles language are different regions. When the language side turns on, the feeling side settles down a little.

Putting a name on a feeling, just by itself, makes it easier to carry. You don’t have to do anything else. Just the name.

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Building a basic emotion vocabulary

Naming feelings requires having words to use. A lot of people only use three or four.

“Good,” “bad,” “pissed off,” “tired.” That’s not enough to describe what’s actually happening.

Here’s a wider set to pull from.

Happiness family

• Happy
• Joyful
• Content
• Relieved
• Calm
• Proud
• Grateful
• At ease

Sadness family

• Sad
• Lonely
• Empty
• Disappointed
• Resigned
• Heartbroken
• Detached

Anger family

• Irritated
• Annoyed
• Angry
• Fed up
• Furious
• Resentful
• Indignant

Fear family

• Anxious
• Scared
• Worried
• Tense
• Panicking
• Dread

Shame family

• Embarrassed
• Ashamed
• Guilty
• Self-loathing
• Like I want to disappear

Other

• Bored
• Exhausted
• Unmotivated
• Confused
• Numb

That’s thirty-plus right there. “Annoyed” and “fed up” aren’t the same. “Sad” and “empty” aren’t the same. “Anxious” and “panicking” aren’t the same.

The more you can tell differences between close-but-different feelings, the higher the resolution gets. Higher resolution means fewer times you have to act something out instead of feeling it.

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Practice noticing

Three times a day, ask yourself

Using the vocabulary takes practice. Three times a day, at set moments, ask.

Morning, afternoon, evening. Pick the times: before meals, during your commute, before bed.

Three questions:

• “What am I feeling right now?”
• “Is there something in my body I can notice?”
• “What’s running in my head?”

Answer each in one or two words. Journal it, or keep it in your head.

”I don’t know” is a valid answer

At first, the only thing you can say is “nothing” or “I don’t know.” That’s fine. “Nothing” is itself an answer.

Keep going, and slowly more words show up. A week in, a month in, your resolution rises.

Watch your body too

Feelings show up in the body.

• Tight neck → tension, stress
• Hot chest → anger, excitement
• Heavy stomach → anxiety
• Lump in your throat → grief, shame
• Light body → happiness, relief

Body sensations let you pick up feelings the head can’t name.

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Using it during a craving

Emotion naming also helps when a craving arrives. “I don’t know why, but I want to gamble” shows up. Stop. Ask yourself:

“What am I actually feeling?”

Think about it.

• Lonely?
• Angry?
• Bored?
• Anxious?
• Tired?
• Numb?

When a word lands, plan a non-gambling response to that feeling.

• Lonely → text someone
• Angry → walk, write it out
• Bored → start a different activity
• Anxious → write out what I’m anxious about
• Tired → sleep

What looked like “I want to gamble” often turns out to be a different need. Meet the actual need, and the gambling pull often disappears.

This is the same logic as the HALT from Chapter 11. HALT is four. Emotion naming is broader.

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A daily routine for naming feelings

Morning check-in

When you wake up, ask one question for one minute. “How am I right now?” Answer in one or two words. Journal it or keep it in your head.

After-event check-in

When something happens during the day, ask right after. “What did that just make me feel?” You don’t have to answer immediately. Three minutes later is fine.

Evening review

Before bed, look back at the day. “What kinds of feelings came up today?” Two or three words.

Weekly review

On the weekend, look back on the week. “What was the strongest feeling I had this week?” “When was the hardest moment?” “When was the easiest?”

Write it in a notebook. A month in, three months in, you start seeing your own patterns of feeling.

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Don’t sort feelings into “right” and “wrong”

Feelings are not right or wrong. What you feel is a fact.

“I shouldn’t be angry about this.” “It’s weird that I’m sad about this.” “I don’t get to feel happy in my situation.”

These judgments get in the way of naming. At the naming step, don’t judge. Just note “I’m feeling this.”

If judgment shows up, write that down as a feeling too. “I’m feeling that I want to reject what I’m feeling.” That counts, too.

References

• Lieberman, M.D., Eisenberger, N.I., Crockett, M.J., Tom, S.M., Pfeifer, J.H., & Way, B.M. (2007). Putting feelings into words: Affect labeling disrupts amygdala activity in response to affective stimuli. Psychological Science, 18(5), 421-428.
• Torre, J.B., & Lieberman, M.D. (2018). Putting feelings into words: Affect labeling as implicit emotion regulation. Emotion Review, 10(2), 116-124.
• Pennebaker, J.W. (1997). Opening Up: The Healing Power of Expressing Emotions. Guilford Press.
• Kashdan, T.B., Barrett, L.F., & McKnight, P.E. (2015). Unpacking emotion differentiation: Transforming unpleasant experience by perceiving distinctions in negativity. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 24(1), 10-16.
• Khantzian, E.J. (1997). The self-medication hypothesis of substance use disorders: A reconsideration and recent applications. Harvard Review of Psychiatry, 4(5), 231-244.
• Greenberg, L.S. (2002). Emotion-Focused Therapy: Coaching Clients to Work Through Their Feelings. American Psychological Association.