Emotions can be a tricky thing, one moment you are feeling fine and living care free. Then out of the blue, we are mad, sad, or nervous and it can happen in an instance. Emotions are a universal trait we all have to deal with, the good and the bad. For children it is the worst! Emotions are these foreign things that they can’t put a finger on and sometime we as adult have an unfair expectation when we ask them how they are feeling. They don’t know a lot of the times, and to be fair many adults still don’t know what they are feeling or how they got to a certain emotion.

There are three things that can help us have more awareness and understanding to what we are feeling.

• Our cognitive thoughts – Our body – And other people

All emotions are processed in the mind, it is where we make sense of how we are feeling and can turn the tide when we are feeling down. Thoughts come and go as they please and it is folly for us to say we can control what we are going to think at all times. However, we can control what we are going to think and that is when we can help ourselves when we are down. Second, we have a physical response to emotions and being aware of how our body responds to this can help us have an indicator or key to our own emotions. Everyone feels emotions differently and sitting down and thinking about how you feel can be very enlightening. Finally, those around us can see our physical responses or can help us with our awareness when we are too caught up in our own feelings. Having an objective eye is always helpful, so invite others to help you with your emotions. Feeling means living and it is no shame to have all the feelings out there, it is a loss when we let them take over.