Pregnancy is one of the natural states for a woman. And yet, this greatly changes the body’s perception of not only the world around it, but also itself. Sensations are especially important in the early stages of pregnancy. They are so diverse that it is worth knowing in advance what to expect for the expectant mother. After all, some of them will indicate that there are deviations from the norm and urgently require medical intervention.
Whether the baby is desired or not, a woman is extremely interested in when pregnancy symptoms appear. Its countdown begins from the first day of the previous menstruation.
Conception occurs in the middle of the cycle. But you shouldn’t expect any sensations at this phase. Only particularly impressionable women talk about them, although they are associated more with impatience than with physiological changes.
The only thing that can be detected is increased vaginal discharge. This reaction of the body is due to the fact that it more actively produces mucus for the subsequent formation of a protective plug.
After another 6-10 days, the fertilized egg takes its place in the uterus. From this event, we can talk about when pregnancy symptoms begin, because some of them are already felt. For example, blood and mild abdominal pain may be mixed with mucus from the genital tract. These signs are usually scary because, verbal description, look menacing. But there is nothing to be afraid of if it does not last more than 2 days. The process of implantation of the egg into the uterine mucosa occurs with damage to blood vessels.
However, for most this event has no visible manifestations. And for them, the question of how long it takes for pregnancy symptoms to appear is still relevant. From the moment the embryo is implanted, we can say that conception has occurred. As the fetus develops, a woman's hormonal background changes, which affects her well-being. Already after two weeks you can feel your new condition.
First sensations during pregnancy
When pregnancy occurs, some of the first sensations that appear are:
- soreness, unusual sensitivity of the breasts, nipples;
- increased volume of vaginal discharge;
- nausea;
- heavy salivation;
- change in reaction to food - favorite dishes become tasteless or generally disgusting, and some new ones, on the contrary, cause increased appetite;
- heightened perception of aromas, even familiar cosmetics and perfumes smell unpleasant, aversion to male odor may occur;
- increased weakness and fatigue, drowsiness;
- abdominal discomfort – bloating, rumbling, soreness;
- the skin becomes hotter to the touch, there are chills and hot flashes;
- frequent mood changes.
Normally, not all of these manifestations may be present or other symptoms may be added to them. The beginning of pregnancy is special for every woman.
Feelings during pregnancy
The psychological state and feelings during pregnancy are associated with hormonal changes. Typically women note:
- irritability;
- tearfulness;
- transitions from laughter to depressed mood;
- anxiety;
- suspiciousness.
Depressive reactions often occur. For some women, on the contrary, the onset of pregnancy coincides with feelings of increased strength and improvement in condition.
Is it normal if I don’t feel like I’m pregnant in the early stages?
Normally, a woman in the early stages may not feel that she is pregnant. This is typical for healthy and young expectant mothers. For most, the very first sensations are very atypical, so you can find out about conception only after a delay and a test.
It’s worse if you previously had all the signs of toxicosis (malaise, nausea), swelling and pain in the mammary glands, and then they disappeared, but bloody discharge appeared. These are signs that the pregnancy has stopped developing. You need to urgently visit a gynecologist.
Sensations in the uterus during early pregnancy
Initial sensations in the uterus during early pregnancy (implantation and strengthening of the fertilized egg) may be:
- feeling of heaviness;
- it seems that the uterus hurts (usually the woman begins to feel it, which was not the case before);
- with a sudden movement or turn, sharp pain occurs in the groin area, lower back or along the inner surface of the thighs;
- there is a feeling of fullness in the stomach, bloating.
In the early stages of pregnancy, not all women notice sensations in the uterus, but as pregnancy progresses, they become much more common.
Such manifestations are associated with the beginning of the growth of the uterus and a change in the load on its ligaments. Often the cause of pain is previous inflammatory diseases of the abdominal cavity. After them, adhesions form and as pregnancy progresses, their stretching can be sensitive.
Can your lower back hurt after conception?
The lower back after conception may hurt in those women who experience similar sensations before the onset of menstruation. Severe pain in the lumbar region, fatigue during prolonged standing, sitting or walking are characteristic of late stages. In the second, and especially the third trimester, the weight of the uterus with the fetus puts a large load on this part of the spine.
What is the belly like in the early stages?
Often, the appearance of the abdomen does not change in the early stages. Less common is an increase in local temperature (hot stomach), tension, and pain. It hardens a little in the lower part when palpated, as the tone of the muscle fibers increases. Due to hormonal changes, digestion is restructured, so bloating and a feeling of twisting in the stomach are possible.
Fetus at the end of the 4th (a), 6th (b) and 9th (c) months of pregnancy Appearance
In the first 2 months, external signs of pregnancy are not noticeable. The abdomen is soft, of normal shape and size, there is no pain when pressed. Closer to 11-12 weeks, you can feel the upper border of the uterus. It thickens and begins to feel like a woman.
Why is my belly hot?
A hot belly may be a reaction to increased levels of progesterone in the blood. Normally, skin temperature increases during pregnancy; this is not a sign of pathology. For some women, it is mainly felt in the abdominal area, but most note that the whole body has become hot.
Tense stomach
Tension of the anterior abdominal wall in the lower abdomen is characteristic of the early stages. This muscle tone protects the developing fetus in the uterus. In addition, against the background of hormonal changes, there is bloating and distension in the intestines. A reason to see a doctor appears if tension is combined with:
- cramping pain,
- temperature rise,
- attacks of nausea and vomiting,
- release of blood.
Why does it hurt
Stomach pain during early pregnancy due to the following changes:
- increased hormone production and changes in intestinal function;
- sprain of the uterine ligaments;
- uterine growth;
- attachment of the fertilized egg (sometimes accompanied by bleeding).
Normally, the pain is moderate or mild, lasts no more than a few minutes, and there is no bleeding. If there is blood from the vagina and pain, it is important to consult a gynecologist and undergo an ultrasound.
My stomach is burning
A burning sensation (stomach burns) occurs due to physiological changes (normal), it is caused by changes associated with the attachment of the fertilized egg, stretching of the uterine cavity and its ligaments. In this case, there is usually only a slight tingling sensation and slight discomfort. These symptoms occur periodically and go away without additional treatment.
If your stomach burns for a long time, there is pain, and your temperature rises to more than 37.3 degrees, then this is a likely sign:
- ovarian diseases,
- herpetic infection,
- threats of disruption.
In order to make a correct diagnosis, an examination by a gynecologist is necessary.
Does it harden?
The abdomen may become hard during pregnancy in the first months due to reflex (protective tension) of the abdominal wall. These changes are not always clearly perceptible, so both a soft and hard abdomen do not confirm or exclude fertilization.
Twisting during pregnancy
The patient describes unpleasant sensations in the intestinal area: twisting, aching, squeezing the stomach. They are associated with the effect of progesterone on the intestinal wall. It relaxes, like the rest of the muscle fibers. Hormonal changes also lead to flatulence, constipation or unstable stool. Typically, such discomfort decreases or completely disappears from the second month of pregnancy.
Cramping pain during early pregnancy
In the early stages of pregnancy, cramping pain is dangerous; it can mean an impending or incipient miscarriage. This complication is characterized by:
- pain above the pubis and in the lower back;
- bleeding from the vagina;
- severe weakness.
Increased nausea and fever are also possible. If there is a threatened abortion, there is a chance to continue the pregnancy. To do this, you need to call an ambulance for hospitalization in the gynecological department. Self-medication is not recommended.
Watch this video about what to do if your stomach hurts during pregnancy and when you should see a doctor:
Can you get chills in early pregnancy?
In the early stages of pregnancy, you feel chills due to the fact that this is how the body reacts to a fetus that is half foreign to it. In addition, due to hormonal changes, body temperature rises, and this may also be accompanied by chills.
This reaction is quite natural and gradually disappears. Prolonged trembling in the body, fever with headache and nausea are signs of infection in the body. Therefore, in all doubtful cases, it is better to consult a gynecologist.
Can high blood pressure be a sign of pregnancy?
For most women, hormonal changes during pregnancy cause 
a decrease in pressure, so its increase is not a specific sign of conception.
Any changes in blood circulation or unusual sensations cannot be unambiguously attributed only to the beginning of fetal development.
To make a correct diagnosis, you need to visit a gynecologist (if there is a delay in menstruation), a cardiologist or a therapist.
On what day after conception does nausea begin?
The typical time for the onset of nausea after conception is the first days of the second month of pregnancy - 5-6 weeks. Nausea appears in the morning or worsens throughout the day. It may be associated with food or occur outside of food intake. In some women, the urge to vomit, changes in taste, and increased salivation go away after 2-3 weeks, but they often bother them throughout almost the entire pregnancy.
Symptoms of pregnancy after conception
The surest symptom for many is the absence of menstruation on time. But this will be revealed later. Some women feel the effects of changes in their body even before their period.
Sensations in the early stages of pregnancy before the delay are weak, they can easily be confused with signs of a cold or overwork. A woman may experience:
- runny nose, sore throat;
- drowsiness, fatigue;
- increased excitability.
Sometimes all of the above is the body’s reaction to a change in the balance of hormones. But it is worth taking into account that immunity is not active at this time. All forces are subordinated to the needs of the reproductive system, that is, the development of pregnancy. Therefore, it is really easy to catch a cold and become overtired.
Increased symptoms
After implantation, embryonic cells begin to actively divide. The body’s task is to provide safe conditions and comfort for the existence of the fertilized egg. At this time the volume increases.
The embryo also adds something new to the composition of the mother’s hormones. This is hCG, which helps the gynecologist make a diagnosis. Under no other circumstances can this hormone appear in the female body. Progesterone and hCG determine how pregnancy begins, the symptoms of which become more pronounced every day.
Symptoms of pregnancy |
Manifestation of symptoms in a pregnant woman |
Nausea |
Nausea usually occurs in the morning, but can occur 2-3 times a day. It can be associated with or without food intake. |
Changes in temperature inside the vagina (basal temperature) |
If a woman has controlled it before, she will notice that BT is at a value just above 37 degrees. This is how the body creates conditions for the development of the embryo. |
Stopping menstruation |
The presence of an embryo makes it impossible and unnecessary to replace the top layer of the uterine lining with a new one. |
Appearance changes |
At the first stage, the belly is not yet growing, but the skin may become covered with pigment spots, acne, and the hair may become oilier or dry and weak. |
Aversion to smells |
This is not only about the smell of food, but also any other. Previously favorite or neutral aromas cause nausea or, at best, irritation. |
Change in tastes in food |
A woman more often craves salty foods or develops an aversion to meat. There may be a need to eat a substance that is not suitable for this purpose. |
And yet, when they discuss what it feels like to be pregnant in the early stages, they mainly mean what happened in the woman’s reproductive system. The main ones are focused in her stomach.
Beginning of pregnancy and the uterus
The main organ that performs work during pregnancy is the uterus. This is a long-term refuge for the embryo. The organ most clearly demonstrates all existing changes.
Sensations in the uterus in early pregnancy are noticeable from the beginning. It has already been said about what a woman can feel when an embryo is implanted in her, but that’s not all. The organ receives increased blood supply at an early stage. This makes him especially susceptible.
If in the normal state not every woman indicates where the uterus is located, during pregnancy she will easily do this. The tissues of the mucous membrane of the organ swell, which may cause a slight heaviness in the abdomen and tingling.
Normal sensations in the early stages of pregnancy do not cause unbearable discomfort, although they will intensify as pregnancy progresses. Based on the reasons that caused them, these manifestations can be divided into groups.
Hypertonicity
The feeling of tension in the stomach is familiar to many in this condition. Its cause is a spasm of the muscles of the uterus, called. When palpating the abdomen 2 months after the start of pregnancy, it is not difficult to find the upper pole of the organ. Such sensations of uterine stoneness in early pregnancy are due to progesterone deficiency.
If it is large, the child will have to be saved with the help of doctors and bed rest. But this also happens during a normal pregnancy due to physical activity and shaking in transport. If a muscle spasm passes quickly and is not accompanied by severe pain and bloody discharge, there is no danger.
Changes associated with uterine growth
Short-term pain in the abdomen in early pregnancy, which appears during intensification motor activity, are localized in the groin area. Women can often feel them with a sudden change in body position, even coughing and sneezing.
In the cases described, this is a common occurrence caused by an increase in the load on the uterine ligaments. The organ is growing, and although this is not so obvious in the early stages, the pressure on its parts increases. Normally, sensations should pass soon after they occur.
The influence of the uterus on neighboring organs
The first sensations in the early stages of pregnancy can be associated, oddly enough, with the bladder and intestines. An edematous uterus and enlargement certainly affect neighboring organs.
From here. The uterus is not yet large, but it has an irritating effect on the walls of the bladder. If a woman tries to reduce her visits to the toilet and endure it, the urge intensifies, and hypertonicity may be added to it.
Unpleasant sensations during early pregnancy are caused by the intestines. They are caused by relaxation of its muscles, like many other abdominal organs. On the one hand, this is nature’s concern for maintaining pregnancy. On the other hand, it can cause flatulence. Dilatation of blood vessels in the pelvic area, inevitable during pregnancy, often provokes the appearance of hemorrhoids.
Beginning of pregnancy and ovaries
During pregnancy, as the uterine tissue grows, the ovaries are pulled towards the upper part of the abdominal cavity. At first, this is not yet as noticeable as as it develops. Actually, on this moment these organs have done their job, that is, they have produced healthy sex cell and their functioning is minimal. Bias internal organs during pregnancy
If, this means that inflammation has begun in them, which pregnancy cannot prevent. It must be stopped, otherwise there is a threat to the fetus.
Vagina during pregnancy
The vagina is the path along which the newborn will make its first movements. This is part of the reproductive system, so changes will affect it too.
Sensations in the vagina in the early stages of pregnancy are determined by an increase in the number and diameter of blood vessels in the pelvis. The embryo requires oxygen and nutrition, which reach its cells through the bloodstream. Therefore, the woman will feel fullness in the perineum area. It is caused by stretching of the capillary and venous walls, pressure of blood on them. The sensations in the lower abdomen in the early stages of pregnancy will be similar.
The vagina and before it produces mucus, which ensures the normal microflora of the organ. During pregnancy, its secretory capabilities increase. A woman notices colorless, odorless discharge. The worst they can bring is a feeling of slight discomfort. But in general this is a common occurrence.
Mammary glands at the beginning of pregnancy
Breasts are a very sensitive part of a woman’s reproductive system. Hormones have a strong influence on it. That is why the mammary glands are the first to respond to the appearance of an embryo in the body.
Nature prepares them to produce milk for the unborn baby, doing this with the help of the hormone prolactin. The glands grow in volume, so even for the first weeks, a woman should stock up on underwear a size or two larger than usual.
As a result, they also become different. She becomes more sensitive to touch, sometimes to the point of pain. The feeling of fullness is added due to the expansion of the ducts through which milk will flow to the nipples.
The skin of the breast becomes somewhat transparent, because the blood vessels are clearly visible on it. The nipples and areolas, on the contrary, become brighter in color, also becoming a little painful.
The boundaries of pregnancy manifestations and dangers for it
All processes in the early stages of pregnancy may not coincide in detail for different women. Moreover, the bearing of the first and second child of the same mother is not the same. It is not always possible to distinguish between ordinary manifestations of the condition and in which cases there is a danger to the fetus. AND Still, there are criteria by which one can suspect something is wrong: Stages of miscarriage in the early stages of pregnancy
Watch the video about early pregnancy and characteristic manifestations:
What if there are two of them?
Some women feel great even while expecting a baby: they hardly feel sick, the discomfort that cannot be avoided is minimal. But this situation practically does not happen if twins are expected (sensations in the early stages of pregnancy can make this felt earlier than an ultrasound).
The load that is carried in this case female body, increases. As can be immediately seen from the hCG study, it will be twice as much. And the volume of progesterone, which ensures pregnancy, which is also the cause of not the most pleasant manifestations, is higher. That's why:
- can be very pronounced;
- soreness of the mammary glands is more noticeable;
- weakness is more pronounced due to the double need for iron;
- the belly becomes larger by the 11th week due to the rapidly growing uterus, and accordingly, all associated inconveniences in the form of hourly trips to the toilet and constipation become more acute;
- abdominal pain can also be more noticeable due to the increased load on the ligaments, which increases the risk of uterine hypertonicity and miscarriage.
Feelings in the early stages of a problem-free pregnancy can be different. Sometimes they are very difficult to endure, but many women have gone through this, which means that anyone can do it. It is important not to confuse normality and pathology, and this can be avoided if you regularly visit a doctor, listen to your body and trust both of them.
Useful video
Watch this video about the sensations during pregnancy:
“People eat when they are lonely, make love when they are angry, speak on the platform when they are sexually anxious. This distortion of the connection between sensations and behavior is evidence of alienation from oneself.” I. Polster.
People often confuse sensations with feelings, and feelings with emotions. Ask your friends: " What is the correct way to say: I feel hungry or I feel hungry? What is resentment: a feeling or an emotion? What about joy?". Having asked these seemingly simple questions, you will get varied and contradictory answers.
Unfortunately, these concepts are often confused in the psychological literature. To my great surprise, having read dozens of books by classics and contemporaries, hundreds of magazine articles, I have never come across a holistic system that clearly distinguishes between feelings, sensations and emotions and provides answers to their semantic differences! It would seem that there is nothing wrong with this, and there is no need to cling to words. There seems to be no pressing need to draw clear and rigid boundaries between the meanings of related words. But this is only at first glance. A clear understanding of the meaning of these words and their differences is relevant for working with the human sensory sphere in all types of psychotherapy and is extremely important in such areas as Gestalt, psychosynthesis and body-oriented psychology.
The distinction between these concepts and the ability to differentiate them allows us to determine the location of the violation in a person’s relationship with himself and the world and purposefully work with it.
Sensations are the process of obtaining information about the properties of objects, phenomena and the internal states of the body. Information comes to us through vision, hearing, taste, smell, touch, vestibular apparatus and kinesthetics (sensory information from muscles, tendons and ligaments). You can compare the sensations with the instrument panel and sensors in the pilot’s cockpit, which show flight parameters: altitude, speed, air temperature, fuel level, wind direction and strength, fuselage tilt, distance to other objects and much more. When I have a sore throat, I feel hot, sick, and heavy in the head, and these are signs that tell me that I am getting sick. If a person is deprived of sensations, then he will not be able to navigate what is happening and will not be able to do anything purposefully.
Feelings have a completely different function. If we compared the sensations with the instrument panel showing flight parameters, then the feelings can be compared with the pilot’s personal assessment of these readings. I remember well that getting sick on the eve of meeting my girlfriend gave me completely different feelings than getting sick on the eve of a physics test. Feelings are a process of personal assessment of a situation, which performs both signaling and organizational-guiding functions. They talk about a person’s attitude to what is happening, showing whether it is good or bad for him. So the feelings play double role: this is a system of signals of well-being or ill-being on the one hand, and a regulator of our desires and aspirations on the other. And if we speak in the language of Gestalt, then a feeling is a holistic signal about the relationship between a person’s needs and the environment. Feelings can carry enormous energy potential, but even in this case they should not be confused with emotions. Emotions are the external expression of our feelings, their presentation to the world around us. This is a non-verbal language of communication that appeared among our distant ancestors many hundreds of thousands of years ago. It helped to understand each other and interact successfully even before the advent of articulate speech and verbal communications. Even higher animals are able to discern our emotional messages by tone of voice and facial expression.
Thus, despite the fact that feelings carry emotional coloring and energy, they turn into emotions only when a person begins to present them to the world and people. As Lowen wrote: “To avoid confusion of these concepts, it should be noted that the word emotion presupposes activity (motion - movement and the preposition e-outward, outward)". (A. Lowen. Psychology of the Body) If, due to the strength of experience or the inability to notice his feelings, a person jumps immediately into the area of emotions, unable to realize his feelings, then they say: "No feelings - only emotions"!
To summarize, we can say that:
- sensations are information;
- feelings - how I feel about it (my assessment);
- emotions - how I react to it, and what I express with it (my reactions and messages to the world).
By looking at these concepts in terms of the functions they perform, it is easy to see their place on the contact cycle curve. Their informational, evaluative and contacting role in the process of satisfying needs cannot be overestimated. I remember how many years ago, at one of the psychological trainings, I was struck by the question of the presenter to one of the group members, whose name was Nastya: “ Who are you crying to and what do you want from it??" And her surprised answer: " Nothing to anyone, I just cry and that’s it, I do this often". Later, I managed to understand her feelings, and the address of her emotions, and what need she was trying to resolve with this. I was amazed that emotions are not an uncontrollable element, but our choice of action and resolution of the need, that emotions have an addressee and a specific goal Whether a crying person realizes this is another question.
Let us consider the sequence of emergence and manifestation of the affective wave “sensations - feelings - emotions” using the example of the cycle of need satisfaction by B. Reznik and T. Barley:
I. Stage of undifferentiation.
II. Figure formation stage.
III. Figure focusing stage.
IV. Field scanning stage.
V. Need resolution stage.
VI. Assimilation stage.
VII. Stage of undifferentiation."
The emergence of sensations, the increase in their intensity and the formation of a vague figure of need corresponds to the level of sensations. Focusing the figure, identifying sensations and evaluating them gives rise to feelings, accompanied by scanning the field to satisfy the need - the level of feelings. The choice of action and resolution of the need corresponds to the level of emotions. Then follows the second, control wave - the level of pleasant sensations - the resolution stage. Withdrawal and assimilation - level of feelings (satisfaction) and final emotions. Next comes a temporary lull, when the field is not differentiated. Unfortunately, this does not always happen.
Often, disruptions to the satisfaction cycle occur due to distorted perceptions of sensations, misidentification of feelings, and unconscious presentation of one's emotional reactions. The situation is complicated by the speech patterns of the language, both Russian and Romance languages. Perhaps things are different in the East, but I can’t say with certainty. We say "sense organs" instead of saying "organs of sensation"; we say “he expresses his emotions” instead of saying “he expresses his feelings,” and of a person with poor emotional expression we say “he has few feelings.” It turns out that we initially do not understand the role of sensations, we put feelings in their place, and emotions in their place.
I would like to repeat Polster’s well-known statement: “L People eat when they are lonely, make love when they are angry, speak from the platform when they are sexually anxious. This distortion of the connection between sensations and behavior is evidence of alienation from oneself.". (I. Polster, M. Polster. Integrative Gestalt Therapy)
If distortions at the level of sensations lead to such consequences, what happens when distortions also occur at the level of feelings and emotions? Feelings of hunger and loneliness, feelings of sexual desire and the emotion of anger. Having learned to distinguish between these concepts, the client will no longer confuse anxiety and hunger, fatigue and depression, attraction and love, confidence and aggression. This list can be continued indefinitely, and you can remember a few of the most bright examples from my practice.
To solve these and similar questions, it seems to me, it is necessary to have:
- The skill of differentiating sensations, feelings and emotions based on their criteria.
- Sensations convey information about the situation inside and outside.
- Feelings are internal assessments, reactions and experiences.
- Emotions are the presentation of reactions and assessments to the world.
- The skill of noticing is awareness of the moments of transition of sensations into feelings, and feelings into emotions, and vice versa.
I offer several interesting exercises to help you gain practical skills in awareness and differentiation.
- "List".
Make as large a list of feelings, emotions and sensations as possible. There is no need to strive to do this in one go. It is better to do this exercise over several days until you have an impressive list of 50-100 or even more items.
- "Sorting".
Break it up into two or three columns. I'm not intentionally saying there should be two or three. It depends on whether you will include feelings and emotions in one list, when one word, depending on the context, can have different meanings, or whether there are strictly determined words. For example, where would you classify resentment? Panic? What about satisfaction?
- "Fitting".
Try on each word from the list - feeling, feeling or expressing it. Note what was easier for you and what was harder. Are there any names on the list that you couldn’t imagine and experience at all? During the day, it is useful to stop for a minute or two and “catch by the tail” the emotion, feeling or sensation you are experiencing, realizing and identifying the “caught beast”. Determine the strength and clarity of the experience using a 10-point scale, 100%, or any other scale convenient for you.
- "Pendulum of feelings."
Listen to yourself and become aware of your current feeling at the moment. Stay with it for a while and then move into the realm of sensation associated with that feeling, noticing and being aware of the location, strength, clarity and other parameters. Return to the area of feelings and see what new shades have arisen in the feeling, or whether it has changed completely. And then, starting from this feeling, go into the area of emotions, noticing how you express them in movements, gestures, facial expressions and intonation. After some time, return again to the area of feelings and realize what you feel now, what has changed and what has appeared.
- "Zone of concern."
When a person is worried about a problem, a zone of concern arises around it from feelings, sensations and emotions. On the one hand, in this area all experiences are stronger and more acute, but on the other hand, they are less clear and stable. This is reminiscent of a room of distorting mirrors, in which a person is distorted so that he looks either a skinny giant, or a wide dwarf, or walking upside down, or stretching forward like chewing gum. By noticing every day - realizing the strength and certainty of feelings, sensations and emotions in this problem area, you will be able to track the positive dynamics of changes in both the zone itself and the problem that gives rise to it. An area where improvements are slower is worth investing more time and effort into.
To summarize, I note that understanding the role and place of these phenomena, as well as the ability to differentiate them, is an important condition for awareness - noticing true feelings, sensations and emotions that will help the client see and restore disruptions in contact with the current need. They are the most reliable indicator of the energy processes occurring in a person during the “disturbance” of the field “organism - external environment". Processes from the moment the first vague sensations arise until the moment the need is satisfied and dissolved in the surrounding background. I am confident that, as long as a person exists, any violation in the "Self" system is necessarily accompanied by greater or lesser changes in the sensory sphere, both through the "Id" function ", and through the "Personality" function. If you run away from recognition and awareness, expecting that everything will work out automatically, on its own, then this will lead to the loss of the "Ego" function as a mechanism for assessing the situation, choosing and making adaptive decisions.
As Perls wrote: “To strive for maximum automatic functioning and minimal awareness - awareness - means striving for death before it comes” (F. Perls, P. Goodman, R. Hefferlin. Workshop on Gestalt Therapy).
H what is a feeling and what is a feeling? Is there a difference between them?
Many people, if you ask them these questions, will probably find it difficult to answer. Or they will say that there is not much difference, and if there is, it is insignificant. But why then do there exist two? different words? Is it just to voice the same thing?
Let's conduct a little experiment and see what kind of ideas are evoked in us, for example, by the following words: “I feel love” and “I feel love.” Let's voice them inside ourselves, listen...
Wouldn't this create a desire? something understand, understand? Will “I feel” not lead us into the depths of ourselves, and “I feel” will not still rush and pour out into the outside, so that we will want to add: “I feel love inside yourself" and "I feel love to someone"?
In other words, already in this rather subjective experiment, if you wish, you can see the direction of our internal attention when we hear the word “sensation” inside ourselves, and the direction when we hear the word “feeling” is outward. And this is quite logical and natural if we turn for clarification to Abd-ru-shin’s book “In the Light of Truth. The Message of the Grail”, in which the mechanism of action in a person of sensation, which relates to the voice of our inner “I”, and the mechanism of the emergence of feeling, having an external nature, special attention is paid.
But before turning to the Grail Message, let's remember one vital experience of the writer Alexander Isaevich Solzhenitsyn. At one time, thanks to the difficult trials of fate, he recognized in himself a certain mysterious spiritual “recognition relay”, allowing him to recognize people at first sight with unmistakable accuracy.
The feeling of constant danger, continuous defense from the cruel external environment that Solzhenitsyn had to face in prisons, during arrests and in pre-trial detention cells, awakened and strengthened in this man something that most of us, unfortunately, are not inclined to pay attention to - the voice of our spirit, feeling. Here's how he writes about it:
“I didn’t yet know the word “mother hen”, nor that there should be one in every cell, I didn’t even have time to think about it and say that I didn’t like this man, Georgy Kramarenko, but a spiritual relay had already worked in me, a relay -recognizer, and closed me forever to this person. I would not have mentioned such a case if it had been the only one. But I soon began to feel the work of this recognition relay inside me with surprise, delight and alarm as a constant natural property. Years passed, I lay on the same bunks, walked in the same formation, worked in the same brigades with many hundreds of people, and always this mysterious recognition relay, in the creation of which I had not a single trace of merit, worked before I remembered it, worked when the sight of a human face, eyes, at the first sounds of a voice - and he opened me wide open to this man, or only a crack, or closed it dully. This was always so unmistakable that all the fuss of the detectives with the snitches’ equipment began to seem like a bug to me: after all, the one who undertook to be a traitor, it’s always obvious on his face and in his voice, with others it’s as if it’s cleverly pretentious - but unclean. And, on the contrary, the recognizer helped me distinguish those to whom, from the first minutes of acquaintance, I could reveal the most intimate, the depths and secrets for which heads would be cut off. So I went through eight years of imprisonment, three years of exile, another six years of underground writing, no less dangerous - and for all seventeen years I recklessly opened myself up to dozens of people - and did not stumble even once! - I haven’t read about this anywhere and am writing here for psychology lovers. It seems to me that such spiritual devices are contained in many of us, but, people of an overly technical and intellectual age, we neglect this miracle and do not allow it to develop in us. "("The Gulag Archipelago", chapter 5)
Thus, Solzhenitsyn experienced first-hand the effects of this amazing “spiritual device”, which is well known folk wisdom, and the exact and detailed description which was first given by Abd-ru-shin in the Grail Messages.
There is no doubt that this knowledge will be of interest not only to lovers of psychology, but is essential for each of us. The Voice Within report states:
As with all such sayings and proverbs, there is a deep truth hidden here. By impression we are accustomed to understand a feeling. What, for example, a person feels when meeting a stranger for the first time is either something like an alarm signal up to complete repulsion, or something pleasant up to complete sympathy, and in many cases simply indifference. "
So, sensation is the voice of our spirit! The voice of that which resides in us as our immortal "I", as our so-called " inner man" - the life-giving core in us, which uses the earthly gross material body as an instrument of the kind of the level in Creation at which we currently reside for the purpose of our development.
This statement will probably seem strange to many people for the reason that they are accustomed to identifying themselves with their earthly body. But this identification is precisely what consequence that spiritual and moral illness of humanity, which the Bible points to, and about which the most insightful and observant people speak, and the causes of which were revealed with convincing completeness and logic by Abd-ru-shin. We are talking about the so-called original sin, the essence of which lies in the hypertrophied development of the human forebrain. This is a hereditary process to which all humanity has been subject for many, many millennia. Because of this, earthly man has become more intelligent, rational, but less spiritual. We have become people, as Solzhenitsyn writes, “of an overly technical and intellectual age”!
At the same time, the life that we carry within ourselves, which means energy and strength, lies only in the spirit. But earthly man voluntarily gave up the reins of government to that which in itself is dead, for it is a product of the grossly material, earthly brain - reason, mind. We have “neglected the miracle” that each of us carries within us as the greatest Gift of God, and we do not allow this miracle to “develop in us.” The consequences of this neglect are now being felt in all areas human activity, and these consequences are catastrophic. For a person, guided by the mind-reason in isolation from his inner voice - sensations, automatically, naturally puts death and destruction into all his endeavors.
One of the unkind consequences of the unrighteous interference of earthly man in the godly order of distribution of roles between the mind-reason and the spirit is the erasure of the distinction between sensation and feeling. For feeling is a product of the earthly body:
“Therefore, stay awake! Feeling is not sensation! The source of feeling is the gross material body. It gives rise to inclinations, which, being directed by reason, in turn give rise to feeling, which has nothing to do with sensation. The joint work of feeling and reason gives rise to fantasy.
So, from the side of the Spirit, we only have a sensation that has ascended above space-time. On the other hand, it is primarily a gross material body tied to space-time. From this body emanate attractions that, with the participation of the mind, give rise to feelings." (Report "Inner Voice")
“Attractions emanate from the body...” - this means that feeling as such consists of a subtler substance than the gross material body itself - from etheric gross materiality.
At the same time, feelings in themselves are not an obstacle to spiritual development, but on the contrary: feelings contribute to the unfolding of spiritual power and the maturation of the spirit, if only they are subordinate to the spirit, subordinate to sensation - then they are pure.
However, by giving the reins to reason, people become sadly dependent on their own feelings. It’s as if they are releasing a genie from the bottle, which they then cannot cope with: slowly but surely finding themselves in slavery to this genie - in slavery to their own people. own feelings! Therefore, such expressions are quite familiar to our ears: “Give vent to your feelings”, “Be captive of a feeling”, “Frenzy of feelings”, but nothing like that can be said in connection with sensation!
And does a person really need to endure many deprivations and restrictions in order for the feeling to be revived in him in its unclouded purity and strength, as happened, for example, with Solzhenitsyn? But this can be achieved in another way - through joy in the knowledge of the Primordial Laws of Creation.
Sensation is the simplest reflection of the material world by the psyche. This is the most primitive type of reflection because only individual elements of this world are reflected. Shall we look at the sun? What is it like? Yellow, bright, warm and painful when you look at it with your eyes.
Classification of sensations
But sensations are not only associated with the senses. Sight, hearing and others that are familiar to us are only exteroceptive sensations, but there are other types of sensations. But still, it is necessary to consider the senses. The sensations of color, shape, distance and everything connected with the eyes are called visual. They are the main assistants in navigating environment. More than 70% of reality is reflected through the eyes.
We also know about auditory sensations which we experience thanks to our ears. This is the second most important type of sensation, since thanks to hearing we can understand what is happening in the world outside our field of vision. For example, thanks to hearing we hear a car approaching. That is, our ears in this case warn us of danger.
Eat kinesthetic sensations. Our skin allows us to experience them. This may be sensations of shape, texture, temperature, pain. Thanks to them, we can feel objects in a dark room and walk to the switch without getting caught on anything.
Our language gives us taste sensations. There are several types of tastes. It is noteworthy that there is no pungent taste. It’s just that very often people call hot peppers hot. In addition to taste, we also have a sense of smell. It is needed to stimulate appetite and interact with the world at the chemical level. Smell is also needed to detect the smell of spoiled food or other life-threatening aromas.
But besides these five, there are also sensations. This is, for example, temperature sensations. Stop. Now you may be thinking, why did temperature sensations end up being separate, if we talked about them when we touched on kinesthetic sensations? What about body temperature? We feel when it rises, it seems to us that we are breathing heat. This is what temperature sensations are.
Tactile may also be associated with painful sensations. But not only our skin hurts, but also any organ. We can give its exact localization, thanks to which we have the opportunity to go to the doctor and say that the heart, liver, stomach, and so on hurt.
Besides these, there are also muscle-joint sensations, which provide information about the position in which we sit, vestibular sensations, which are needed for spatial analysis, and vibration sensations, which we can often hear at rock concerts. These are intermediate sensations between tactile and sound.
“People eat when they're lonely, make love when they're angry, speak out when they're sexually anxious. This distortion of the connection between sensations and behavior is evidence of alienation from oneself.” I. Polster
People often confuse sensations with feelings, and feelings with emotions. Ask your friends: “What is the correct way to say: I feel hungry or I feel hungry? What is resentment: a feeling or an emotion? What about joy? Asking these seemingly simple questions will yield varied and contradictory answers.
Unfortunately, these concepts are often confused in the psychological literature. To my great surprise, having read dozens of books by classics and contemporaries, hundreds of magazine articles, I have never come across a holistic system that clearly distinguishes between feelings, sensations and emotions and provides answers to their semantic differences! It would seem that there is nothing wrong with this, and there is no need to cling to words. There seems to be no urgent need to draw clear and rigid boundaries between the meanings of related words. But this is only at first glance. A clear understanding of the meaning of these words and their differences is relevant for working with the human sensory sphere in all types of psychotherapy and is extremely important in such areas as Gestalt, psychosynthesis and body-oriented psychology.
The distinction between these concepts and the ability to differentiate them allows us to determine the location of the violation in a person’s relationship with himself and the world and purposefully work with it.
Sensations are the process of obtaining information about the properties of objects, phenomena and the internal states of the body. Information comes to us through vision, hearing, taste, smell, touch, vestibular apparatus and kinesthetics (sensory information from muscles, tendons and ligaments). You can compare the sensations with the instrument panel and sensors in the pilot's cockpit, which show flight parameters: altitude, speed, air temperature, fuel level, wind direction and strength, fuselage tilt, distance to other objects and much more. When I have a sore throat, I feel hot, sick, and heavy in the head, and these are signs that tell me that I am getting sick. If a person is deprived of sensations, then he will not be able to navigate what is happening and will not be able to do anything purposefully.
Feelings have a completely different function. If we compared sensations with an instrument panel showing flight parameters, then feelings can be compared with the pilot’s personal assessment of these readings. I remember well that getting sick on the eve of meeting my girlfriend gave me completely different feelings than getting sick on the eve of a physics test. Feelings are a process of personal assessment of a situation, which performs both signaling and organizational-guiding functions. They talk about a person’s attitude to what is happening, showing whether it is good or bad for him. Thus, feelings play a dual role: they are a system of signals of well-being or ill-being on the one hand, and a regulator of our desires and aspirations on the other. And if we speak in the language of Gestalt, then a feeling is a holistic signal about the relationship between a person’s needs and the environment. Feelings can carry enormous energy potential, but even in this case they should not be confused with emotions. Emotions are the external expression of our feelings, their presentation to the world around us. This is a non-verbal language of communication that appeared among our distant ancestors many hundreds of thousands of years ago. It helped to understand each other and interact successfully even before the advent of articulate speech and verbal communications. Even higher animals are able to discern our emotional messages by tone of voice and facial expression.
Thus, despite the fact that feelings carry emotional coloring and energy, they turn into emotions only when a person begins to present them to the world and people. As Lowen wrote: “To avoid confusion of these concepts, it should be noted that the word emotion presupposes activity (motion - movement and the preposition e- outward, outward)." /A. Lowen. Psychology of the body/. If, due to the intensity of the experience or the inability to notice one’s feelings, a person jumps straight into the area of emotions, unable to realize his feelings, then they say: “There are no feelings - only emotions”!
To summarize we can say that:
- sensations are information;
- feelings - how I feel about it (my assessment);
- emotions - how I react to it and what I express with it (my reactions and messages to the world).
Let us consider the sequence of emergence and manifestation of the affective wave “sensations - feelings - emotions” using the example of the cycle of need satisfaction by B. Reznik and T. Barley:
I. Stage of undifferentiation.
II. Figure formation stage.
III. Figure focusing stage.
IV. Field scanning stage.
V. Need resolution stage.
VI. Assimilation stage.
VII. Stage of undifferentiation.
The emergence of sensations, the increase in their intensity and the formation of a vague figure of need corresponds to the level of sensations. Focusing the figure, identifying sensations and evaluating them gives rise to feelings, accompanied by scanning the field to satisfy the need - the level of feelings. The choice of action and resolution of the need corresponds to the level of emotions. Then follows the second, control wave - the level of pleasant sensations - the resolution stage. Withdrawal and assimilation – level of feelings (satisfaction) and final emotions. Next is a temporary lull, when the field is not differentiated. Unfortunately, this does not always happen.
Often, disruptions to the satisfaction cycle occur due to distorted perceptions of sensations, misidentification of feelings, and unconscious presentation of one's emotional reactions. The situation is complicated by the speech patterns of the language, both Russian and Romance languages. Perhaps things are different in the East, but I can’t say with certainty. We say: “sense organs” instead of saying: “organs of sensation”; we say: “he expresses his emotions” instead of saying: “he expresses his feelings,” and about a person with poor emotional expression we say that “he has few feelings.” It turns out that we initially do not understand the role of sensations, we put feelings in their place, and emotions in their place.
I want to repeat Polster's well-known statement: “People eat when they are lonely, make love when they are angry, speak from the platform when they are sexually anxious. This distortion of the connection between sensations and behavior is evidence of alienation from oneself.” / I.Polster, M.Polster. Integrative Gestalt Therapy/. If distortions at the level of sensations lead to such consequences, what happens when distortions also occur at the level of feelings and emotions? Feelings of hunger and loneliness, feelings of sexual desire and the emotion of anger. Having learned to distinguish between these concepts, the client will no longer confuse anxiety and hunger, fatigue and depression, attraction and love, confidence and aggression. This list can be continued indefinitely, and you can recall some of the most striking examples from your practice.
To solve these and similar questions, it seems to me, it is necessary to have:
1) The skill of differentiating sensations, feelings and emotions based on their criteria.
- Sensations convey information about the situation inside and outside.
- Feelings are internal assessments, reactions and experiences.
- Emotions are the presentation of reactions and assessments to the world.
I offer several interesting exercises to help you gain practical skills in awareness and differentiation.
"List"
Make as large a list of feelings, emotions and sensations as possible. There is no need to strive to do this in one go. It’s better to do this exercise over several days until you get an impressive list of 50 – 100 or even more items.
"Sorting"
Break it into two or three columns. I'm not intentionally saying there should be two or three. It depends on whether you will include feelings and emotions in one list, when one word, depending on the context, can have different meanings, or whether there are strictly determined words. For example, where would you classify resentment? Panic? What about satisfaction?
"Fitting"
Try on each word from the list - feeling, feeling or expressing it. Note what was easier for you and what was harder. Are there any names on the list that you couldn’t imagine and experience at all? During the day, it is useful to stop for a minute or two and “catch by the tail” the emotion, feeling or sensation you are experiencing, realizing and identifying the “caught beast”. Determine the strength and clarity of the experience using a 10-point scale, 100%, or any other scale convenient for you.
"Pendulum of Feelings"
Listen to yourself and become aware of your current feeling at the moment. Stay with it for a while and then move into the sensory realm associated with that feeling, noticing and being aware of the location, strength, clarity, and other parameters. Return to the area of feelings and see what new shades have arisen in the feeling or whether it has changed completely. And then, starting from this feeling, go into the area of emotions, noticing how you express them in movements, gestures, facial expressions and intonation. After some time, return again to the area of feelings and realize what you feel now, what has changed and what has appeared.
"Zone of concern"
When a person is worried about a problem, a zone of concern arises around it from feelings, sensations and emotions. On the one hand, in this area all experiences are stronger and more acute, but on the other hand, they are less clear and stable. This is reminiscent of a room of distorting mirrors, in which a person is distorted so that he looks either a skinny giant, or a wide dwarf, or walking upside down, or stretching forward like chewing gum. By noticing every day - realizing the strength and certainty of feelings, sensations and emotions in this problem area, you will be able to track the positive dynamics of changes in both the zone itself and the problem that gives rise to it. An area where improvements are slower is worth investing more time and effort into.
To summarize, I note that understanding the role and place of these phenomena, as well as the ability to differentiate them, is an important condition for awareness - noticing true feelings, sensations and emotions that will help the client see and restore the violation of contact with the current need. They are the most reliable indicator of the energy processes occurring in a person during the “disturbance” of the “organism - external environment” field. Processes from the moment the first vague sensations arise until the moment the need is satisfied and dissolved in the surrounding background. I am confident that as long as a person exists, any violation in the “Self” system is necessarily accompanied by greater or lesser changes in the sensory sphere, both through the “Id” function and through the “Personality” function. If you run away from recognition and awareness, expecting that everything will work out automatically, on its own, then this will lead to the loss of the “Ego” function as a mechanism for assessing the situation, choosing and making adaptive decisions. As Perls wrote: “To strive for maximum automatic functioning and minimum awareness—awareness—is to strive for death before it comes.” /F. Perls, P. Goodman, R. Hefferlin. Workshop on Gestalt therapy/.
