The Seven Core Emotions: How Your Brain Helps You Understand What You Feel

If you’ve ever wondered why emotions can feel so big—or why they sometimes take over before you have time to think—you’re in good company. Emotions are biological. They come from deep, ancient parts of the brain, and they exist to help us survive, connect, and navigate life.

Neuroscientist Jaak Panksepp identified seven basic emotion systems that all mammals, including humans, share. Each one creates a unique emotional experience and shows up in the body in its own way. When you understand these systems, identifying your feelings becomes easier and more intuitive—an important first step in managing them.

Here’s a simple guide to each emotion system and the typical body signs associated with it:

1. SEEKING – Curiosity and Motivation

This system gets you moving toward goals.
Body Signs: alert eyes, energized posture, slight increase in heart rate, interest, leaning forward.

2. FEAR – Anxiety and Threat Response

Helps you detect danger and stay safe.
Body Signs: fast heartbeat, tense muscles, shallow breathing, freezing or wanting to escape, wide eyes.

3. RAGE – Anger and Frustration

Activates when something blocks your path.
Body Signs: heat in the face, clenched jaw or fists, raised voice, tight shoulders, narrowed focus.

4. LUST – Sexual Desire

Supports bonding and intimacy.
Body Signs: warmth, arousal responses, focused attention, physiological sexual readiness.

5. CARE – Warmth and Affection

Supports closeness, empathy, and nurturing.
Body Signs: softening facial muscles, relaxed breathing, warm tone of voice, desire to comfort.

6. PANIC/GRIEF – Sadness and Separation Distress

Activates when connection feels lost.
Body Signs: tightness in the throat or chest, tears, heaviness, low energy, slumped posture.

7. PLAY – Joy and Social Connection

Encourages bonding through fun and laughter.
Body Signs: smiling, laughter, loose movement, lightness in the body, bright eyes.

Why This Matters for Managing Emotions

The first step in emotional regulation is identification—being able to notice and name what you’re feeling (as psychiatrist, Dan Siegel says, “name it to tame it”). When you recognize the body cues, you can understand what your system is trying to communicate. From there, you can use specific tools to regulate, soothe, or support the emotion in a healthy way.

Learning these seven systems gives you a map:
not just what you feel, but why you feel it—and what your body is asking for next.

References

Damasio, A. (1999). The feeling of what happens: Body and emotion in the making of consciousness. Harcourt.

LeDoux, J. (2015). Anxious: Using the brain to understand and treat fear and anxiety. Viking.

Panksepp, J. (1998). Affective neuroscience: The foundations of human and animal emotions. Oxford University Press.

Panksepp, J., & Biven, L. (2012). The archaeology of mind: Neuroevolutionary origins of human emotions. W. W. Norton & Company.

Siegel, D. J., & Bryson, T. P. (2011). The whole-brain child: 12 revolutionary strategies to nurture your child’s developing mind. Delacorte Press.

Solms, M. (2019). The neurobiological underpinnings of psychoanalytic theory. Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience, 13, 1–13.

The Pendulum of Truth: What Postmodernism Taught Me About Mental Health

In college, I signed up for a course on postmodern culture and philosophy—thinking I’d spend a semester reading dense texts and debating abstract ideas. What I didn’t expect was to find myself in the pages of the textbook.

At the time, I was volunteering for a nonprofit organization. Coincidentally, the director of that very organization had been invited to adjunctly teach the postmodernism course. One day, as we worked through a chapter describing institutions that embodied a rigid, modernist mindset—unable or unwilling to adapt to cultural shifts—I saw a familiar name. There it was: the nonprofit I volunteered for, listed as an example of a modernist holdout.

It was ironic. It was awkward. And it was a perfect window into how theory meets real life.

Postmodernism and the Pendulum of Truth

One of the central themes of postmodern thought is the loosening of our reliance on external sources of truth—institutions like churches, governments, or other authority structures. The deconstruction of these systems often creates space for individual thought, personal conviction, and deeply subjective experience.

There is a real gift in that shift. People who once felt silenced by institutional “truth” suddenly have permission to listen inward, speak freely, and trust their own lived experience.

But pendulums tend to swing hard.

In many circles today, subjective experience has been elevated to a new unquestionable authority. If I feel it, think it, or experience it, the logic goes, then it is true.

This is simply the mirror opposite of what modernist institutions once imposed: truth dictated from the outside, regardless of inner conflict. Now it is truth dictated from the inside, regardless of external reality, community wisdom, or historical perspective.

Neither extreme is stable. Neither honors the full complexity of being human.

Holding the Tension: A Healthier Approach to Truth

Historically—and psychologically—the most resilient way of understanding truth is to hold tension rather than collapse it. A mature sense of truth weaves together:

• Inner truth: What I feel, think, and experience

• Relational truth: How others experience me and the world

• Historical and communal truth: What generations before us have learned, named, and passed down

When one of these is ignored, the system breaks down.

And this brings us to mental health.

What Is Mental Health, Really?

Mental health is often defined clinically, but at its core it is something simple and profoundly human:

Mental health is the ability to think, feel, and act with flexibility—while holding both our own viewpoint and the viewpoints of others.

In other words, it is the capacity to be rooted and responsive. To know what we know, while remaining open to how others see it differently. To inhabit our inner world without losing sight of the outer one.

This requires humility. Curiosity. And an ability to tolerate discomfort without either collapsing or hardening.

If reading this definition feels offensive, destabilizing, or irritating in any way, that may actually be a meaningful invitation. What part of you feels threatened by holding multiple truths at once? What inner or outer authority feels at risk of losing its position? What do you fear might happen if truth becomes something shared rather than owned?

These are not questions with quick answers. But they are the very questions that open the door to growth.

Why This Matters

We are living in a cultural moment shaped by both deconstruction and hyper-individualization. Understanding how we arrived here—and how these forces shape our inner lives—can help us find a more grounded, resilient path forward. This is not to repeat a sense of outward knowledge being dominate. It is to voice a song that might be worth hearing in the midst of the moment.

Mental health does not live at either end of the pendulum. It lives in the tension between inner wisdom and communal wisdom, between personal truth and shared truth. Without such a tension debate and growth can’t exist.

And holding that tension well is one of the most important skills we can cultivate.

What Is EMDR Therapy? | Analog Counseling Clinician Michael Wieberg Explains

What Makes Therapy Work | Michael Wieberg of Analog Counseling Shares His Approach

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It’s Giving Lost in Translation: How the Internet (and Our Brains) Shape the Way We Talk

Ever notice how you sometimes can’t quite find the right words? Or how you end up using a meme, a GIF, or a slightly silly phrase to say something that’s actually kind of serious?

You’re not alone — and it’s not just about personality or style. The way we speak is shaped by bigger forces than we might realize: our brains, our culture, and yes, even the algorithms running our favorite social media platforms.

When the Internet Rewrites the Rules

On apps like TikTok or Instagram, people sometimes bend their language to avoid getting their posts taken down or buried by the platform. Instead of saying “suicide,” for example, someone might say “unalive.” Instead of writing out a “controversial” word, they might replace letters with symbols.

Linguist Adam Aleksic calls this algospeak — language that’s been reshaped to play by the algorithm’s rules. Over time, these workarounds can become part of how people talk even offline.

Why Our Words Are Always Chasing Meaning

Here’s the thing: language has always been a bit slippery. Words are like little containers for meaning, but they’re limiting and they’re leaky — they can’t hold everything we feel or experience.

Philosophers like Jacques Derrida and psychoanalysts like Jacques Lacan pointed out that words don’t give us pure, fixed meanings. They point to other words, which point to more words, and so on — raw meaning is always moving.

Neuropsychiatrist Iain McGilchrist adds a brain-based twist:

• Our right brain lives in the richness of real, lived experience.

• Our left brain translates that into symbols and categories (like words).

This means every time we speak, we’re re-presenting an experience — not giving it in its raw form. And sometimes, a simple curse word or a meme can point back to the original feeling more directly than a carefully chosen “polite” term.

Meme Language: The New Emotional Shortcuts

Meme phrases like “it’s giving…”, “big yikes”, or “this is fine” can pack a surprising amount of meaning into just a few words. They carry a whole emotional tone, a cultural reference, and sometimes even a shared joke.

That’s why you might notice yourself — or your friends — slipping into meme language when talking about something real. It can:

• Soften vulnerability (“I’m low-key freaking out” instead of “I’m really anxious”)

• Make a connection (shared cultural references feel bonding)

• Say a lot quickly (a meme phrase can sum up a whole situation in seconds)

But meme language can also act like a mask, giving a safe, humorous cover for feelings that might be hard to express directly.

The Quiet Frustration We All Feel

Whether it’s algospeak, meme talk, or just struggling to find the right word, there’s a shared, subtle frustration in being human: what we feel inside never lands exactly the same way when we put it into words.

That gap can feel a little lonely. And while social media didn’t create this gap, it does make it more obvious — especially when we bend our language to dodge filters or fit into online trends.

Why This Matters for Your Relationships (and Your Mental Health)

The words we choose aren’t just about communication — they’re clues. If you notice yourself switching words, joking instead of naming a feeling, or defaulting to a meme, it can be worth asking:

• Am I protecting myself from something?

• Am I trying to connect without being too vulnerable?

• Is there something I want to say more directly, but don’t know how?

Therapists often listen for these shifts in language because they can point toward deeper feelings, hidden fears, or important parts of your story.

A Takeaway

The next time you hear yourself using a workaround word, a meme, or an online code phrase, pause for a second. That little twist in language might be doing more than you think — it might be carrying emotion, hiding it, or wrapping it in a form that feels safer to share.

Either way, it’s giving… human.

The Temptation of Judgment and the Ethics of the Other: A Reflection Through Levinas (and Beyond)

People want so desperately to control. Whether it’s a situation, an outcome, or another person’s reaction, we long for the comfort of predictability. But underneath this striving lies something more tender: a deep desire to feel safe, gratified, or simply at ease. Control is often less about dominance and more about protection.

When someone offends us—leaves us confused, angry, or hurt—it’s common to skip over the truth of our own emotional experience and reach instead for judgment: “What’s wrong with them?” “They always do this.” “That was manipulative.” In that moment, rather than saying, “I felt hurt, confused, and disoriented,” we flip the lens outward. It’s quicker. It feels cleaner. And it gives us a fleeting sense of authority over what is, in truth, a vulnerable internal state.

But what’s important to recognize is that these judgments aren’t just conscious strategies—they’re often defenses, and by definition, defenses are unconscious. They arise automatically, like emotional reflexes. We don’t choose them; they choose us. They operate beneath awareness to protect us from the discomfort of disrupted, dysregulated emotional states.

And yet, we can become aware of them. Awareness is possible—but it requires slowing down, and it requires courage. Because stepping away from a defense doesn’t mean we return to peace; it means we step into the very vulnerability the defense was shielding us from. We open ourselves to feeling raw, uncertain, exposed.

This is where the philosophy of Immanuel Levinas can guide us. Levinas teaches that the face of the Other is not merely a surface to interpret or explain—it is a site of ethical demand. The Other is not for us to define, control, or consume with judgment. The Other is sacred. And to encounter the Other ethically means to resist the impulse to reduce them into categories we can manage.

To define the other person—“they’re just selfish,” “they’re emotionally immature,” “they always do this”—is, in Levinas’ view, a subtle act of violence. We substitute our interpretation for their humanity. We replace their infinite otherness with a version of them we can control. And in doing so, we fail the ethical call their presence places on us.

But this work—the work of stepping out of defense and into presence—is not always equally available to everyone. This becomes exponentially more difficult within unjust power dynamics.

Jessica Benjamin, in her psychoanalytic and feminist work, reminds us that mutual recognition is not just a psychological achievement; it is a relational and political act too. Where there are asymmetries of power—based on gender, race, age, class, or role—the ability to “see and be seen” is compromised. The one with more power may unconsciously negate the subjectivity of the other—a process Benjamin names as a failure of recognition.

In relationships shaped by trauma, hierarchy, or systemic injustice, both the more powerful and the less powerful parties may engage in defensive acts that negate the other’s subjectivity. Benjamin calls this a doer or done to configuration. Which is basically a combat situation, someone is winning and someone is losing and the both people are wrestling for domination. This often takes the form of unconscious denial—a way to protect against our own vulnerability. This negation isn’t always overt; it can appear as withdrawal, silence, or avoidance. In response to the other person may also negate as a way to preserve their sense of self in the face of ongoing dysregulation and a lack of safety in reaction to feeling negated.

In this context, stepping out of defense is more than just difficult—it can feel existentially threatening. When someone has learned that expressing pain leads to punishment, dismissal, or rupture, moving toward emotional truth requires more than personal bravery. It demands relational scaffolding: trust, attunement, and often a supportive community that can help hold the weight of that risk. Only in such environments can enough safety and shared wisdom emerge to support true adaptation and mutual recognition. Which, for Benjamin, is healthy relating, each person offering a recognition and validation of the other person’s perspective without losing a sense of their own.

So what do we do?

We start where we can. We practice awareness, we build capacity to sit with our own disrupted states, and we work to notice when we are defining others too quickly or too harshly. We strive to live, as Levinas suggests, not from the ego’s desire to master, but from the soul’s openness to the face of the Other.

And we hold ourselves accountable—not just to our feelings, but to the structures of power we inhabit. The call to love, to see, to stay open is not just personal—it’s profoundly ethical. Especially when we hold more power, the work is to risk meeting the Other without collapsing them into our judgments.

Reflection Prompt:

Next time you find yourself mentally diagnosing or dismissing someone’s behavior, pause. Ask yourself:

• What am I feeling underneath this judgment?

• What defense might be at play here?

• Am I unconsciously negating their subjectivity to protect myself?

• What power dynamics are shaping this moment?

You don’t have to answer perfectly. But asking opens the door to something sacred: an encounter marked not by control, but by care.

Mapping the self: a guide to emotional healing and wholeness

By Analog Counseling & Consulting Services

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Emotions Aren’t the Problem—They’re the Map

Emotions are your body’s internal GPS. They aren’t obstacles—they’re signals that something needs attention.

They arise before conscious thought and aim to help you regulate, connect, and adapt. But when we block emotions—due to trauma, fear, shame, or survival needs—they go underground and show up as distress, anxiety, numbness, or disconnection.

The Triangle of Conflict and Change: A Map for Healing

Based on the work of Hilary Jacobs Hendel, Diana Fosha, and David Malan the Triangle of Conflict and Change helps us move from distress and defenses toward clarity and connection.

1. Defenses (Top Left)

Anything we do to avoid feeling:

• Overthinking
• Numbing
• Blaming
• Scrolling
• Addictions
• Perfectionism

2. Inhibitory Emotions (Top Right)

These are the “red lights” of our emotional system:

• Anxiety: Am I safe?
• Shame: I am bad.
• Guilt: I’ve done something bad.

They block access to deeper core emotions.

3. Core Emotions (Bottom Point)

These are biological, adaptive feelings:

• Grief / Panic
• Rage
• Lust
• Play (Social Joy)
• Fear
• Care
• Seeking (Motivation / Curiosity)

Trauma: A Stuck Emotional Response

Trauma is not the event itself—it's what the nervous system does after the event.

When emotional responses can't complete (crying, running, connecting, yelling), they stay stuck. The nervous system gets trapped in fight/flight/freeze. Instead of completion, we move into coping (i.e. defenses).

What Inhibitory Emotions Feel Like

Anxiety

• Racing heart
• Tight chest
• Breathlessness
• Dizziness
• Racing thoughts
• Nausea

Guilt

• Muscle tension
• Crying
• Restlessness
• Insomnia

Shame

• Feeling exposed
• Frozen
• Wanting to hide
• Blushing or hot
• Feeling “less than”

The Threat Response Cycle

Novelty → Orient → Assess → Respond → If needed Fight/Flight/Freeze → Rest

In trauma, completion of the response doesn't happen so we never get to the “rest” part. The system stays alert, reactive, and to cope with that dysregulation we dissociate through using defendes. The body never feels safe enough to feel as long as the original dysregulation maintains without support or help.

How to Work the Triangle

1. Undo the Defenses

• Notice what defense you're using
• Reflect on how it feels to be defended
• Thank the defense—it's trying to protect you
• Gently ask it to step aside and observe what happens

2. Calm and soothe the nervous system from the Inhibitory Emotions

Use somatic tools like:

• Name that you are feeling a red light emotion
• Physiological Sigh (i.e. the double inhale)
• Orienting to notice you are safe and to give your nervous system a chance to reset (a specific Somatic Experiencing skill)
• Focusing on lowering heartrate, softening muscles, deepening breath, etc.

3. Build Safety With Emotions

Use somatic tools like:

• Voo breathing
• Grounding (feet, breath, body awareness)
• Swaying, walking, rocking
• Journaling, art, or music to evoke and explore emotion

4. Practice Feeling in Safe Ways

• Start slow—don’t flood yourself - focus on restful/calm/strong/positive feelings first
• If you start to notice tension in your body, as long as it's not overwhelming or flooding, stay with it until the wave of actation dies down stay with the sensations themselves to do this
• After a wave of activation and de-activation journal about the feelings and memories that you experienced
• Share how you feel with someone you trust
• Notice how it feels to be heard

Two Powerful Healing Modalities

Somatic Experiencing (SE)

Helps the body complete stuck trauma responses through:

• Grounding & orienting
• Gentle touch work
• Tracking bodily sensation
• Building capacity to feel safely

EMDR Therapy

A structured process that helps “digest” traumatic memories:

• Recall a memory while using eye movements or tapping
• Let feelings, images, and beliefs surface
• Notice how the memory shifts or lightens over time

Your Healing Goals

The goal isn’t to “get rid” of emotions. It’s to feel them safely, let them guide you, and return to your authentic self.

You can learn to:

• Calm your physiology
• Understand your emotional cues
• Feel without shutting down or overreacting
• Reconnect to others in meaningful ways

Summary: Mapping the Self

• Emotions are Signals: Not problems. They tell us what we need.
• Trauma is Dysregulation: Not just the event. It’s what sticks.
• Healing = Feeling: Safely, with support, and in the body.
• Defenses + Red Light Emotions = Blocks
• Core Emotions = Authenticity + Adaptation
• Therapies like SE and EMDR help complete the cycle

References

• Hendel, H.J. (2018). It’s Not Always Depression
• Panksepp, J. & Biven, L. (2012). The Archaeology of Mind
• Porges, S. (2017). The Pocket Guide to the Polyvagal Theory
• Levine, P. (2010). In an Unspoken Voice
• Solms, M. (2021). The Hidden Spring
• Badenoch, B. (2017). The Heart of Trauma

*If you ever become flooded or overwhelmed stop the exercise and comfort/soothe yourself. Then consider waiting to engage the feelings again until with a professional.

Understanding the change triangle and it’s relation to somatic experiencing

This is an image I made that is slightly different than Hendel or Fosha or Malan’s triangle. It uses Panksepp’s basic emotion systems and integrates in Porges’ Polyvagal Theory.

The Change Triangle is a practical map of emotions developed by Hilary Jacobs Hendel, grounded in accelerated experiential dynamic psychotherapy (AEDP), affective neuroscience (especially the work of Jaak Panksepp), and psychodynamic theory. It's designed to help people move from states of anxiety, shame, and depression toward core emotions, open-hearted states, and authentic connection with self and others.

Overview of the Change Triangle

The triangle has three points:

1. Top Corners (Defensive & Inhibitory Emotions):

   • Defensive behaviors (e.g., sarcasm, people-pleasing, intellectualizing) block emotional experience.

   • Inhibitory emotions include (I used the title “Red Light Emotions” above):

     • Anxiety

     • Shame

     • Guilt
       These act like red lights, blocking or overriding core emotional experience.

2. Bottom Point (Core Emotions):
   These are universal, biological, adaptive emotional responses hardwired in the brain.
   Core emotions include (again - in the image above I’m using Panksepp’s core emotion systems vs the emotion list from Hendel as listed below):

   • Anger

   • Sadness

   • Fear

   • Joy

   • Excitement

   • Disgust

   • Sexual excitement

3. Authentic Self (Middle of the Triangle):
   When core emotions are felt and processed fully, a person can access their authentic self, characterized by clarity, calm, confidence, and connection.

Inhibitory Emotions in the Nervous System

1. Anxiety

A global arousal signal of the autonomic nervous system (ANS), especially the sympathetic branch (fight or flight). It arises when core emotions are experienced but cannot be tolerated or expressed safely.

• Brain regions:

  • Amygdala: hyperactive in threat detection

  • Hypothalamus: triggers HPA axis → cortisol release

  • Insula: processes internal sensations (interoception)

  • Prefrontal cortex: may attempt to suppress emotional awareness

• Somatic markers: Rapid heartbeat, muscle tension, restlessness, tight chest, shallow breathing

Reference: Porges, S. (2017). The Pocket Guide to the Polyvagal Theory; LeDoux, J. (2015). Anxious: Using the Brain to Understand and Treat Fear and Anxiety

2. Shame

An inhibitory emotion triggered by perceived failure to meet social or internal standards. It shuts down expression of vulnerable states.

• Biological function: Social protection. Prevents ostracism by curbing behavior that could threaten connection or belonging.

• Brain regions:

  • Medial prefrontal cortex: self-evaluation

  • Anterior cingulate cortex: emotional pain and conflict

  • Periaqueductal gray: immobility response (freezing)

• Somatic markers: Collapse posture, averted gaze, facial flushing, desire to hide or disappear

Reference: Nathanson, D. L. (1992). Shame and Pride: Affect, Sex, and the Birth of the Self; Gilbert, P. (2003). Evolution, Social Roles, and the Differences in Shame and Guilt

3. Guilt

Another socially-oriented inhibitory emotion, guilt helps preserve social bonds by motivating reparative actions when behavior conflicts with moral values.

• Brain regions:

  • Ventromedial prefrontal cortex: decision-making tied to values

  • Temporal parietal junction: perspective-taking

  • Insula: subjective emotional awareness

• Somatic markers: Sinking stomach, tight chest, sense of heaviness, tears

Reference: Zahn, R. et al. (2009). “Social Concepts Are Represented in the Superior Anterior Temporal Cortex.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

Why They Block Core Emotions

Inhibitory emotions function like internal brakes. They arise when core emotions trigger conflict, fear of rejection, internalized shame scripts, or trauma-based reactions. For example:

• Feeling anger → triggers shame (“I’m bad for feeling this”) → emotion gets blocked

• Feeling sadness → triggers anxiety (“If I cry, I’ll lose control”) → body tightens, emotion suppressed

Rather than expressing the core emotion, the person may default to defensive behaviors (e.g., pleasing, avoiding, dissociating).

Somatic View: How They Exist in the Body

Peter Levine's Somatic Experiencing and Porges’ Polyvagal Theory explain that inhibitory emotions often result from overcoupling — when activation of core emotion is paired with danger signals from the body.

The nervous system constricts, narrows awareness, and attempts to “shut down” to maintain regulation and social safety.

Over time, chronic reliance on inhibitory emotions leads to:

• Autonomic dysregulation (chronic sympathetic or dorsal vagal dominance)

• Disconnection from felt sense

• Reduced affect tolerance and expression

Reference:

• Levine, P. (2010). In an Unspoken Voice

• Panksepp, J. (2012). The Archaeology of Mind

• Hendel, H. J. (2018). It’s Not Always Depression

The Seduction of Thinking: When We Mistake Analysis for Feeling

In therapy, I often ask clients, “Can you describe what you’re feeling—what it actually feels like?” I’m inviting them into their embodied experience: the tightness in the chest, the flutter in the stomach, the heat behind the eyes. But more often than not, what I hear back is, “It feels like it means…”

This response is familiar—and telling.

Our culture rewards insight, action, and interpretation. We’re praised for what we make of a moment, not for the quiet work of sensing and staying. Slowing down to feel is not something we’re taught, and if we’ve experienced trauma, it may not even feel safe. Trauma trains the body to cope, not feel. And in the absence of safety, thinking becomes a powerful—if unintentional—way to avoid feeling altogether. It can even become part of our identity, “a thinking person not a feeling person”.

But this avoidance comes at a cost.

When we think in place of feeling, we lose access to vital information that arises from within. Our nervous system isn’t waiting on us to invent meaning—it already knows. But its language is slow, subtle, and bodily. It needs space, and sometimes support, to speak—and for us to listen.

When we short-circuit this process with premature interpretation, we miss out on:

• Knowing when we don’t feel safe

• Recognizing when we do

• Clarifying what we want

• Sensing the emotional tone in a room (social intelligence)

• Accessing the deeper, creative problem-solving that emerges from felt awareness

These aren't just “soft skills.” They are central to how we live, love, and make decisions. And without them we run the risk of living blindly.

The work, then, is to notice when we're thinking instead of feeling—and gently return to the body. That’s where the real conversation begins.

The Cult of Meaning-Making: When Thinking Hijacks Feeling

In our fast-paced culture, thinking is often elevated as the highest human function—our prized problem-solver, meaning-maker, and escape hatch. But thinking, as necessary as it is, can become a trap. Especially when it overrides our capacity to feel.

Neuroscience tells us that emotions come first. Literally. We feel before we think. Research by Jaak Panksepp and Lucy Biven (2012) demonstrates that emotional experience arises from deep subcortical structures in the brain—what they call the “core self”—before the neocortex (the seat of conscious thought) even gets involved.

Yet when we feel overwhelmed, vulnerable, or dysregulated, we often reach for thinking as a shield. We lean into analysis, planning, interpreting—often without realizing we're doing it to avoid the raw intensity of emotion. This pattern shows up neurologically in the dominance of the left prefrontal cortex—what psychiatrist and philosopher Iain McGilchrist (2010) describes as the left hemisphere’s narrow, detail-focused grasp on the world.

McGilchrist’s work reveals that the left hemisphere, especially the top-left-frontal region, tends to "make meaning" even when it lacks full data. It creates interpretations to soothe uncertainty—even if the result is distorted, fragmented, or, frankly, wrong. It favors coherence over truth. It would rather invent an answer than admit it doesn't know.

And here’s the rub: the left brain doesn’t have direct access to the richness of lived experience. It depends on the right hemisphere—our embodied, relational, and emotionally attuned brain—for that. The left side is secondary. A translator. A map-maker, not a navigator. As McGilchrist puts it, “The right hemisphere sees the whole, the left sees the parts and confuses the map for the territory” (McGilchrist, 2010).

The danger is cultural as well as personal. A society dominated by left-brain modes of thought can become obsessed with control, explanation, and certainty. Feeling is dismissed as irrational. Intuition is sidelined. Opinion replaces embodied knowing. As a result, we become more reactive, less reflective—and more cut off from ourselves.

But there’s another way.

Like many in the fields of affective neuroscience and psychotherapy, I invite a return to the wisdom of the body. As developmental neuropsychologist Allan Schore (2012) suggests, we can "shift down and to the right"—from the high-speed highways of left-brain cognition to the slower, more relational terrain of the right hemisphere and subcortical brain.

This shift asks us to pause. To feel. To listen to our body’s signals—its tension, breath, heart rate, gut response—before rushing to interpret or explain. It’s in this space, Schore says, that self-regulation becomes possible. And once we’re regulated, the deeper wisdom stored in our emotional and somatic systems begins to rise.

Our nervous systems are not just reactive—they're adaptive. But they need time. Time to feel before we think. Time to notice before we narrate. Time to allow the truth of our experience to emerge from the inside out—not be forced from the top down.

So let’s resist the cult of premature meaning-making. Let’s be willing to not know for a little while longer. In that not-knowing, something truer may take shape.

References

• Panksepp, J., & Biven, L. (2012). The Archaeology of Mind: Neuroevolutionary Origins of Human Emotion. W. W. Norton & Company.

• McGilchrist, I. (2010). The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World. Yale University Press.

• Schore, A. N. (2012). The Science of the Art of Psychotherapy. W. W. Norton & Company.