Wellness Calendar: Monday 13 May

Emotions without recognised names

In The Book of Human Emotion by Tiffany Watt-Smith, she explores how different cultures have a different emotional language. Some emotions may be encouraged more or less than others, while some may not be recognised or named in certain countries, where they are in others.

What if we had no words to describe love or boredom? Would we then experience love and boredom in a different way? What if love was considered to be a negative emotion, listed somewhere between stress and anxiety?

What was happening before road-rage came along? Is the experience of manic depression different now that it’s known as bi-polar? Whatever happened to collywobbles? Do we still get them, even though we don’t use the word anymore?

In Thailand, there is a word – greng jai – that describes a feeling of not wanting to impose on others or to put another person to any trouble. Kaukokaipuu is a Finnish word for craving a distant land.

Do you have an emotional experience that you do not have a name for? If so, can you describe it?

Save to My SD scrapbook