We all go through times of emotional distress, isn’t it? We feel broken, hurt, shattered, disappointed, or numb. The list of emotions a human mind can experience can go on and on. Researchers identified 27 unique emotions [i] and you could be feeling any one of them or most of them.

On Zero thinking we will be discussing feelings of anxiety, depression, shame, guilt, hurt anger, and grief. And the role of our environment and relationships to make us feel this way. We will also investigate the role of childhood and its impact on the individual. 

Don’t worry we will not only be dissecting the problems, we will go step by step towards our emotional healing and well-being.

So are you ready? Let’s take some baby steps. We will start by understanding what is mental health and emotional healing. 

Mental health is a state in which you are connected with your body, mind, and soul. Mental health includes emotional, psychological, and social well-being. Mental health is important in every phase of life, from childhood and adolescence through adulthood. There could be many factors that contribute to mental health problems, including:

• Biological factors, such as genes or brain chemistry
• Life experiences, such as trauma or abuse
• Family history of mental health problems

We will try to dig into these factors one by one and try to come towards emotional healing.

For that, we need to understand what is emotional healing? 

Dr Harry Barry explains emotional healing as a process and includes two components:

1. Identifying our emotional responses to any negative experience which has occurred in our life as our thinking patterns, perceptions, and beliefs underlying such emotions and finally the unhealthy patterns that came as a result of them.
2. After identifying these, how we reshape these thoughts, emotions, and behaviors with the goal of healing ourselves. 

We will one by one study emotions and its relation to our environment and its impact on our personality. 

And for that, you need to wait for the next article in which we will discuss what are emotions and how can we identify them. Till then have a good day.

  [i] Cowen AS, Keltner D. Self-report captures 27 distinct categories of emotion bridged by continuous gradients.

By Tooba Tahir

Hello there, how are you? I’m sure you have identified the type of anxiety you feel. If not, then please read the previous article so that you receive a better understanding of yourself. 

Today we will briefly discuss what are panic attacks and phobias. And later explore techniques to deal with them. So, let’s get started

So what do you think are panic attacks?

Panic Attack

Well, panic attacks arise suddenly, usually without warning, and often at the most inappropriate time and place. It is a sudden episode of fear that causes physical reactions. You might feel that you are losing control, having a heart attack, or dying.

Few signs of Panic Attack 

Sense of impending doom or danger, fear of loss of control or death, pounding heart rate, sweating, trembling, shortness of breath, chest pain, headache, dizziness, numbness, feeling of unreality or detachment.

The challenging part of panic attacks is the constant fear that it might occur again so people avoid the situations in which it might get triggered. 

What causes panic attacks?

There could be multiple reasons since they come suddenly without any warning, so they are mostly triggered by certain situations. Some panic attacks occur due to stress, Temperament that is prone to negative emotions, for example, unhealthy thinking habits or it can also be genetics. 

Now that we have a little understanding about Panic Attacks, lets briefly touch base on what are phobias?

What are Phobias?

In simple words, a phobia is an excessive or irrational fear reaction. Phobias can lead to panic attacks. There are many kinds of phobias and they can interfere with work, the educational and personal life of people. 

Few types of Phobias are:

Glossophobia: Fear of speaking in front of an audience. 

Acrophobia: This is the fear of heights. 

Claustrophobia: This is a fear of enclosed or tight spaces. 

Aviophobia: This is also known as the fear of flying.

Dentophobia: Dentophobia is a fear of the dentist or dental procedures. 

Hemophobia: This is a phobia of blood or injury. A person with hemophobia may faint when they come in contact with their own blood or another person’s blood.

Arachnophobia: This means fear of spiders.

Cynophobia: This is a fear of dogs.

Ophidiophobia: People with this phobia fear snakes.

Nyctophobia: This phobia is a fear of the nighttime or darkness. It almost always begins as a typical childhood fear. When it progresses past adolescence, it’s considered a phobia.

Now that you know a bit about panic attacks and phobias, it’s a humble request to identify your phobias and notice the symptoms during panic attacks. It’s time to dig deep into self-reflection and ask yourself few questions like when I feel shortness of breath? When I am fearful? And write them on a piece of paper. In the next article, we will explore a case study to understand how we can manage our panic attacks and phobias. 

Till then stay strong. 

Hi everyone, hope you all are doing well. In the previous article, we discussed what is mental health and emotional healing. If you missed out on that article, please go back and read it before you read this one.

Today we will be exploring what are emotions and what are the ways to identify them. Also, I will give you a small exercise towards the end, which will help you understand your emotions and yourself better. 

So what are emotions? 

To answer this we need to understand what the conscious and unconscious mind is. According to Freud “The conscious mind contains all of the thoughts, memories, feelings, and wishes of which we are aware at any given moment. The unconscious mind is a reservoir of feelings, thoughts, urges, and memories that are outside of our conscious awareness.[i] 

Emotions are intense feelings or sensations which can be triggered by conscious and unconscious events. They are connected to our thoughts and behaviors and play an important role in our lives. 

Emotions can be positive, negative, healthy, and unhealthy.

Positive emotions include joy, happiness, pleasure, love, contentment, and peace. We call them positive emotions as they make us feel positive about ourselves. 

Healthy negative emotions such as sadness help us cope with difficulties such as loss. But it helps us to come in terms with some loss in our lives.

Unhealthy negative emotions often impede us in dealing with such difficulties as we classify depression as negative emotions. They make us feel bad about ourselves. 

Whatever emotion we feel it has physical symptoms. For example, anger may mean clenched muscles or tension headaches, fear may lead to dry mouth or difficulties in breathing. 

Emotions are connected to our behaviors and are interwoven with our thoughts. We are most uncomfortable talking about how an event made us feel? In my teaching experience, men usually take more time than women to identify or reflect on their emotions. 

If we want to heal, we need to open our wounds. Let us start with the discussion on our childhood. Write down the events that created unhealthy negative or healthy negative emotions in your life. 

Here is the list of few emotions that can help you identify what emotions you experienced:

Unhealthy negative emotions

Anxiety

Depression

Hurt

Anger 

Shame

Guilt

Frustration 

Healthy negative emotions may include:

Concern 

Sadness

Remorse

Regret

Disappointment 

Annoyance 

Next time you hear me, I hope that you have taken some time out to do this exercise. And identified the negative emotions you have been carrying inside you.  

  [i] https://www.verywellmind.com/the-conscious-and-unconscious-mind-

 Emotions & types of emotions by DR Harry Barry