Knowing the difference between what I am feeling verses my mood has been extremely important for my recovery.<\/p>\n
Everyone has moods and feelings. Yes, everyone!\u00a0\u00a0Even including your loved one who has no diagnosis.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s not that we should not have moods or feelings, but for those of us with bipolar disorder it is because of our brain malfunctioning that without recovery our moods can swing too drastically or get stuck and\u00a0interrupt<\/u><\/strong>\u00a0our daily living.<\/p>\n Early on in recovery I was afraid to feel. It\u2019s was as though I feared becoming\u00a0too\u00a0happy or too sad or too this or too that. But, to feel is human.\u00a0\u00a0Life is filled with feelings and unresolved feelings can affect our mood.\u00a0\u00a0So, knowing how to express my feelings, feel them and work through them was key to managing my mood.<\/p>\n In\u00a0a word picture here\u2019s what I believe is the difference between feelings and mood: your mood is like the regional climate and your feelings are the daily weather.\u00a0\u00a0Let\u2019s say you live in Slouthern Florida.\u00a0\u00a0The climate is tropical.\u00a0\u00a0No freezing weather in the winter right?\u00a0\u00a0Wrong. I lived there one year and we had freezing rain and it was a mess!\u00a0\u00a0But, that didn\u2019t change the climate of Florida.<\/p>\n Feelings are going to come and go. And\u00a0when we handle them properly and work through them they do not have to alter our mood so drastically that they cause a total interruption to our lives.\u00a0Something sad can happen on Monday and I might be sad about it for a time.\u00a0\u00a0But, that does not necessarily mean is one of depression. However, even as I am feeling sad, I do keep my \u201ceye\u201d on it lest it cause a drastic mood shift.\u00a0\u00a0Make sense?<\/p>\n How do see the difference? Are you afraid to feel?<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Knowing the difference between what I am feeling verses my mood has been extremely important for my recovery. Everyone has moods and feelings. Yes, everyone!\u00a0\u00a0Even…<\/p>","protected":false},"author":34,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[64,65],"class_list":["post-1366","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hope-and-encouragement","tag-feelings","tag-moods"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n