Vocabulary 30 - More Words that Express Emotions
Lakshmi was emotionally upset because she had failed her English test.
Manav’s brother beat him with a hockey stick. Manav got hurt and he yelped with pain.
These two examples depict two kinds of sensations. Lakshmi’s reaction to her failure in the English test was to get
upset which will stay with her for some time and she may overcome her
disappointment with a good performance in the next test.
Manav felt the physical pain of getting hurt and that pain vanished when his brother stopped hitting him. Here, in addition to the physical pain, which stops after the hitting stops, Manav’s mind is storing the act of his brother hitting him and will trigger different sensations which may result in
anger, revenge, compassion or
fear.
Every day we go through different emotions. Sometimes we are very happy throughout the day when we think of some good news and the happiness stays with us. Our happiness is expressed in all we do and our friends may remark, rather surprisingly, as to why we are so very upbeat.
Sometimes the converse is also true, as when we have had a bad thought at the beginning to the day and we carry it with us. This may make us sad, angry or ashamed.
It is often not possible to draw a definite line between emotions and feelings. While emotions are almost always sensations that follow one’s state of mind and are predominantly led by thoughts that are internal to a person, feelings are a result of external stimuli and are predominantly physical in nature. Also, feelings can stem from thoughts.
There are many words in the English language that can be used to express feelings and emotions and the quiz that follows exposes you to some of these words.