Most People Don’t Know the Difference Between “Feelings” and “Emotions”

The single most cliche question in all of psychology is, “How does that make you feel”. And yet I find that even my colleagues (other therapists) are poor at distinguishing between “feelings” and “emotions”.

For most people, feelings and emotions might as well be synonymous; words used almost interchangeably to mean the same things. When I ask someone “how does that make you feel” they will likely reference broadly to their current experience.

Ironically, most people will respond not with feelings or emotions, but rather, with a thought.

For Example:

“How did it make you feel when your husband did that?”

“It makes me feel like he would rather spend his time playing fantasy football than spending time with me.”

From what a person describes you can still likely empathize with them. If someone would rather play a recreational game instead of spending quality time than they might feel somehow diminished, inconsequential, disappointed, frustrated, saddened and disheartened. We can intuit feelings from thoughts, but they are far from the same things.

However, how we would react to being “angered” is different than feeling “ saddened”.