Are We Decoding Our Feelings Correctly?

  

Trying To Put Language On A Stream Of Excited Neurons

   “Are We Decoding Our Feelings Correctly?”

    There are moments when something in us awakens before we even have the chance to put a single word to it. When the amygdala fires, it doesn’t speak our language at all — there is no language. Instead, it sends out a silent tremor, a raw current that rushes through us and can nudge our behaviour quite strongly without asking permission. Later on, the prefrontal cortex tries to step in, attempting to tidy the mess and regain control, to give some shape to the chaos — but the truth is, decoding our own feelings is still our job.

To face this challenge, the hippocampus, that quiet archivist of memories, can step forward with old scenes and old lessons, hoping to help us understand what just happened.

But the truth is… feelings are often misunderstood. At least, I misunderstand mine often enough. And when that happens, our behaviour can twist in unexpected directions — in small moments of everyday life, or in our interactions with people who mean something to us.

Who hasn’t acted strangely because a feeling pushed them to do so? Anger that fogs everything, frustration that bites at the edges of our thoughts, love that blinds us, or even that ridiculous state of being hangry which makes the world feel unfair for no good reason. It sounds silly, but it happens.

So I wonder: are we decoding our feelings correctly — or even remotely close? I dare say… probably not at all.

We crave putting words to feelings, as if naming them cleans them, softens them, makes them acceptable to ourselves and to society. But the moment we push a feeling through the fine filters of social language and expectation, perhaps what comes out is no longer the true thing. Maybe the original feeling had a wildness we’ll never fully know again.

Is this necessarily bad? I don’t think so — I daresay that in many cases it’s even good for society. Feelings are wild creatures: sudden, instinctive, uninvited. They burst into the room and we are left to deal with them — ignore them, distort them, fight them, misunderstand them… or learn from them. We cannot choose when a feeling arrives, but we can choose how we decode it, and how much importance we let it take.

And maybe that’s what truly shapes our daily lives: not the raw feeling itself, but how we translate it… and how we try, imperfectly, to fit it into the world we live in.

Toni Font, Aberdeen 03/12/2025