What does it mean to feel?

[as****]

Out of curiosity, what're your thoughts on what it means to emotionally feel? How it grows, how its tended, its use and purpose etc

[Th****]

It means to be alive human

[Sl****]

I have a suggestion. Look at your furbie and think of your emotions when your kiddo is happy, tired, anxious, scared, angry and cuddly. Think of how your mind and body react to each of those emotions. That’s an idea of what emotional feelings are.
It grows when your partner is just as eager to meet you with that energy. But the feelings become galvanized when you feel similarly about your partner as you do of your pet, especially when it’s reciprocated, by providing each other with a place to feel safe to be yourselves without judgment negativity or jealousy. It’s tended to by being present and receptive but also by being aware of how your partner feels and matching them there as well. Its use and purpose? You see how furbie reacts when treated with love and affection without any selfishness but with unconditional love.

[Ruff_woodZ]

Emotional feeling is there for your overall mental health and brain activity. Then relate everything exists with an emotion and a feel of time and space. We take a picture with our photogenic brain and store it with the rest of the seconds of that day. So I'm in theory of more active life with brain stimulation the healthier the brain. Now in my perception emotional feelings are life. Now my question is What makes a life's meaning?

[Te****]

To feel is to be loved and alive

[La****]

For simple: it’s something that makes you human. You feel—when there is something moves you. Your heart, your mind. It creates chain of reactions. Positive or negative. However, even though heart and mind cannot be separate, a lot of times—people tend lean more towards one function. When you decide things only your heart, it possibly would make you do something irrational. But, usually it would creates deeper bond with someone. When you decide with only your mind, it makes you more cautious towards the after effect. It’s way more precise, but it detaches you from the human connection. Therefore, you need to use and have both functions healthy. As the two create a feeling, and the reaction afterwards.

[Be****]

Brilliantly said Lady_King

[Mu****]

I tell you sometimes being emotionally attached and then being crushed is an ugly feeling.

[Te****]

Too feel other souls intertwine through mutual understanding love and respect in an non judgmental world can be a beautiful thing

[Deleted Member]

That’s a really good question, and one that people often don’t slow down enough to ask.

 

To me, emotionally feeling isn’t just about intensity or reaction - it’s about awareness and presence. Feelings exist whether we notice them or not, but emotional depth comes from being willing to sit with them rather than immediately acting on, suppressing, or intellectualising them away.

 

How it grows

Emotional capacity grows through attention and safety. When someone feels allowed to experience what’s coming up without being judged, rushed or corrected, those feelings tend to become clearer and more nuanced. Growth doesn’t usually come from dramatic moments - it comes from repeated experiences of being seen, heard, and responded to consistently. 
 

How it’s tended

Feelings need tending the way trust does: gently, regularly, and without ***. That means:

- naming what’s there without exaggeration or minimisation

- allowing space for emotions to change without clinging to them

- responding rather than reacting

 

Trying to “fix” feelings too quickly often stunts them. Letting them breathe tends to strengthen emotional intelligence rather than overwhelm it.

 

Use and purpose 

Emotion isn’t just something to endure or enjoy- it’s information. It tells us what we’re drawn to, and what hurts. When we ignore emotional signals, they tend to get louder or leak out sideways. When we listen to them, they often become quieter and more cooperative.

 

In relational spaces ( especially kink or D/s), emotional feelings serves an additional purpose; it creates depth and meaning. Without emotional awareness, connection becomes performative. With it, intimacy becomes grounded and mutual rather than transactional.

 

One important distinction 

Feeling deeply doesn’t mean being ruled by emotion. In fact, the people who feel most fully are often the ones best able to regulate themselves, because they aren’t afraid of what they’re experiencing.

 

In short; emotional feeling is not weakness, indulgence, or chaos. It’s a skill. One that grows with practice, safety, and honesty - and one that tends to make relationships richer rather than more complicated.

[vincent1]

Sometimes it's the opposite that really makes you feel just because you got great dick or something doesn't mean that's the one you ever miss someone or crave someone you'd do anything or loose some one you'd fight Jesus you get to a point were the normal is the twisted and a crazy is the smartest most sain how do you view life and my own topic

[vincent1]

So switch you perfur Dom or sub do you believe in karma energy and how are you doing today

[wo****]

I appreciate you sharing this. It touches on something fundamental, and it’s not something I’ve seen expressed quite this way before. I don’t have the time right now to respond fully, but I want to sit with it and come back to it later.

[Deleted Member]

Its a blessing AND a curse. When you feel positive feelings; love, compassion, empathy, joy etc, it feels like a warm hug on a spring day. A cup of mint coffee on a chilly day. That smile from a friend whom you haven't seen in a while. But to feel sorrow, grief, anger, despair, depression.. can be defining. Like a mountain has been dropped on you..... However, I have learned that sometimes without *** and suffering I get stuck. Like a mental blockage. So to reiterate what someone else said... to feel is to be alive..... think of it as a drug addict who uses *** to not feel... they are emotionally and spiritually dead even if their body still lives.

[wo****]

“Feeling” isn’t just what shows on the surface—it’s what shifts inside us, often long before we can put it into words.

Feeling is the subjective experience of emotion. It exists once it alters perception, attention, or internal regulation.

What triggers that shift isn’t the same for everyone. Feelings arise from how each of us perceives the world, shaped by past experience. Two people can go through the same situation and feel very different things. It’s not because one is “more emotional,” but because their internal systems interpret it differently.

Our histories shape this. What felt safe, threatening, rewarding, or overwhelming earlier in life teaches us what to notice, what to worry about, and what to relax around. Over time, those patterns become automatic. We feel first, and often only later try to explain why.

When a feeling comes from trauma, the process is different. The response isn’t just about what’s happening right then; it’s shaped by memory and association. The feeling can intensify, not because the original event is happening again, but because the body remembers how it had to adapt.

Because our nervous systems are shaped by both ordinary and traumatic experience, feelings can look very different from the outside. The way we express emotions vary. Our emotions can be displayed almost immediate and intensely, or be revealed with subtlety. They can also be contained and managed internally. All are real emotional experiences. The difference isn’t depth or authenticity—it’s how the internal response has learned to organize, regulate, and protect itself.

[Deleted Member]

Based on other material I have seen under your username, you are well spoken and intelligent, this post seem to ask for basic structure so I am replying understanding that structure is your ask.

My assumption: this is a question that stems to understand / correct the gap created by disassociation or emotional suffocating

Here goes. This is not going to be high level language intentionally. This is my understanding of the physical aspects (chemical, electrical = signal) of emotional feeling.

Feeling works the same way hunger does.

Hunger isn’t an idea.

It starts as a physical signal. A tightness. A hollow. A drop.

Same as an emotion, hunger can be ignored until its signal is no longer noticeable. E.g. I don't eat breakfast or lunch, only dinner. I have denied my hunger for so long I don't even know what that signal is anymore.

When I want to reclaim this signal I first have to make intentional effort to welcome it back, give it space to exist, create structure using common sense timing. Interestingly similar to how one would enter a relationship.

When is XYZ normally supposed to happen, what is my body saying, how can I encourage this?

If I eat, how does my body react, if I feel the same (or worse), maybe I wasn't hungry.

If I am more alert and energized, maybe that signal was hunger, what else was there? A grumble? A tightness? A mood?

The more you can evaluate where the lost signal should be, and what extra cues exist at that point the focus narrows.

Once you can get agency of your hunger signal, you can feel hungry again. The more you are focused the more pinpoint it can get, think cravings, salt deficiency and dehydration craves salty snacks, protein deficiency is insatiable with carbs alone, ect.

Your body says something is missing. The mind adds the story later, I am hungry.

Emotion works the same way.

Emotional signal satisfaction comes with emotional signal focus towards gaining emotional agency and awareness.

It starts in the body first. Warmth, tension, heaviness, lightness, expansion, contraction.

The label (sad, excited, safe, hurt) comes after.

You don’t manufacture it. You notice it.

Growth happens the same way hunger becomes clearer when you stop ignoring it.

The more you pause and ask what is my body doing right now? the louder the signal gets. The more you name it and give it substance the more you create stability for the feeling.

Formula: My body feels like this + these cues = emotion

Formula: My body feels heavy + I got bad news, the weather is off, I'm late for work = I am sad.

Formula: My body feels heavy + uneventful, the weather was fine, I worked out = I am tired.

Remember these emotions are not universal exacts, this is your personal experience and your individual emotion. This is your interpretation of the chemical and electrical impulses and signals. A back rub is nice/irritating depending on the individual circumstances.

Tending it should be like tending plants, slow, consistent, understand the the preferred (or accepted) operating conditions (sun/water requirements), remove pressure to perform, be in environments where nothing is being asked of you, let a reaction exist and finish, instead of overriding it.

When a system is flooded with noise, it stops differentiating. Everything feels flat. Even a plant gets overwhelmed.

Not because nothing is there, but because everything is happening at once.

Feeling exists to orient you. It tells you, this draws me closer, this pushes me away, this hurts, this nourishes.

If you had to teach someone emotion start where you would start with a tiny human who doesn't understand large concepts yet.

Start with likes and dislikes, warm blanket vs hot stove. And work towards more belief only based emotions love, trust, pride, honor. Those feelings are belief structure and that requires a lot of scaffolding.

The take away from this. We were not born with all these emotional feelings. We learned a lot of them. So if we forget some, we can learn them again.

[Deleted Member]

On 1/16/2026 at 3:02 AM, astrafjord said:

Out of curiosity, what're your thoughts on what it means to emotionally feel? How it grows, how its tended, its use and purpose etc

What many people say they "feel" are really not feelings at all but thoughts. Feelings are actual "felt" the same way you can feel something touching you. They are physical manifestations of our emotional state. Happy, sad, ***, anxious, hungry etc. You don't have to think those up.  You feel them.

Thoughts can definitely influence feelings and feelings thoughts but they are not synonymous. Your thoughts can make you happy, sad, ***ful, etc. but they are not the physical manifestation of the emotional state themselves.

Also feelings are internal to you. As soon as it's no longer "I" then it's really a thought. An example. "I feel like you...." <- nope, you do not feel that. You think that. That is a thought. Again that thought can heavily influence an actual feeling but it is not the feeling itself.

[Deleted Member]

So I did a job in Alaska this winter and I had my friend Jessie watch my dog Bernice at his house. I missed her so much I would just say that to whoever was around at least 10 times a day. Then I would call Jessie on face time so I could see her face to face and tell her I loved her. Jessie said it wasn’t until the 4 th day that her tail curled back up. I would say that me and my dog Bernice have a strong emotional connection. She was so happy when I got back from that job when she saw me she was dancing around and rubbing up against me and hugging me for like 10 minutes straight. Then when I got her in the truck I had a breakfast burrito waiting for her lol I need her in my life and just thinking about if something ever happened to her scares me. And when new people are over she sits in front of me always keeping an eye on them protecting me. I hope one day I have a wife that is emotionally attached to me like Bernice.