Emotions are a physiological response - that is, although your brain controls emotion, you will experience them in your body.

For example, you may feel sadness as heaviness in your heart or shoulders and tenseness and worry as lump or constriction on your chest. Because of this bodily response, you are more likely to notice low moods and emotions before you notice the thoughts in your mind.

There is a reason we try to run away from things that scare us - our built-in evolutionary response is to either Fight or Flight. We might have been running away from lions or dangerous enemies in the past, but these days we are more likely to be running away from situations, places, people, and even thoughts and feelings. We are strongly driven to protect ourselves and to keep away or avoid things that we perceive as threatening - and often the experience of negative emotion (e.g., sadness, hurt and rejection) feels threatening and painful.

At times, our natural response is to fight back (rather than run away) when we need to deal with fear, worry and anxious feelings. You may notice yourself fighting back when you become angry or aggressive - at these times, if you can step back and notice, you may see that your confrontational attitude is masking a level of fear and uncertainty inside.

Emotions, like your thinking, are an important part of your evolutionary heritage - they are there to warn you when there are lions in the bush behind you and to sensitize you to the movements of other animals and people.

Thousands of years ago listening to your emotions allowed you to take appropriate action to protect yourself and your family. Thousands of years later your emotions still do the same thing (although in a very different environment) - often providing you with information that your brain has processed below your awareness level. Your job is to listen.

What you can do

Pay attention to the emotions that you experience over the day. Can you name the emotion? Whereabouts in your body do you feel it?