River: Emotional intelligence
Today I have been reading about Emotional Intelligence, at a site I found while looking up alexithymia, which is basically the opposite, and is a condition I already knew I have.
I think it probably explains a number of things about me, including the fact that I have trouble communicating with Colleen, and the fact that I haven't gotten much out of therapy. With both of the therapists I've tried, I've seemed to go through an initial period of getting my immediate questions answered, and then I run out of questions and am left with a vague feeling that something is wrong or missing, but no words to express it with.
I suppose it must be frustrating for everyone else, too -- the therapists who can't help me because I can't coherently express what's wrong, the women I've had brief relationships with who felt that there was something important missing that they couldn't quite pin down. My kids. Colleen.
I don't know whether there's much to be done about it. Here's a list of "feeling words" -- many of which don't even seem to me to describe feelings at all.
There's a related term: Emotional Literacy. I had an experience of its opposite, emotional illiteracy, yesterday, when I completely failed to pick up on the emotional consequences of something N said to me in an IM.
I've been told that I have a lot of empathy. Sometimes I wonder. Other times I think I suppress it because it overloads me. Other times I'm just plain baffled.
[Crossposted from mdlbear.dreamwidth.org, where it has
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