How to Strengthen Emotional Intimacy with your Partner

In this episode, Kate and Eric MacDougall explore the profound impact of emotional granularity on relationships.

Topics: ➡️ The importance of a broad emotional vocabulary. ➡️ How mindfulness and embodiment deepen emotional understanding. ➡️ The benefits of expressing diverse emotions in relationships.

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TRANSCRIPT:

Kate MacDougall
Today, we're talking about emotional granularity. Like, it's a huge word, just to say we're trying to understand our emotions at a deeper level at a more granular level. Yeah. You know, like, I think a lot of people have these like three main emotions, they can name off the top of their head, angry, sad, happy, sad, happy, sad, mad. That's it. And that's like, when somebody is like, what's going on with you? How are you feeling? I'm happy. I'm good. Happy. I'm sad. I'm feeling sad or I'm feeling mad. And that's it.

Eric MacDougall
I don't even say that. I'm fine. I'm good.

Kate MacDougall
Not good. Yeah, so I think that, as individuals, I think it's so important for us to expand our vocabulary when it comes to our emotions. And by doing this by understanding that I have more emotions than just being sad, mad or happy, I can then express myself more clearly to people in my life. So if I'm always saying, Oh, I'm angry. Well, a lot of the times when you tell your partner, for example, like I'm feeling angry, and you're pregnant, like is like, Well, what about and you can't really figure it out. You're like, I don't know what I'm angry about. I'm just like, I feel angry. That's probably because you're not. You're you don't have an expansive vocabulary when it comes to your emotions. Yeah, it's probably because you're not feeling angry. You're feeling something that feels inside your body like anger. But it could be something else. Such as you're feeling nervous. You're feeling

Eric MacDougall
scared, we're anxious. I'm Campbell. Sure. So,

Kate MacDougall
I mean, you you've probably heard of like the wheel of emotion, right? Yeah,

Eric MacDougall
there's a whole bunch of different types out there. So just Google we'll have a motion, we'll have feelings, feelings, we Oh,

Kate MacDougall
yeah. So many. And that I know, for me was the first step in expanding my vocabulary when it came to my emotions. Yeah, it's I had this feeling in my body. And I knew it felt this way. But I didn't know how to name it. I knew it was like, angry, but it was like, it's not exactly anger. And by not completely understanding how I'm feeling, or not having the word to put on that feeling, I can't then help other people help me.

Eric MacDougall
And it's also very hard to express yourself, exactly your feelings. Because typically, when somebody asks you how you're feeling, you will tell them a story. Or you'll, you'll just like, talk about some of the things you're thinking about. And you're not actually labeling your emotion or talking about your feelings. And there's another thing here that I think a lot of people are not aware of, which can be very unhealthy, borderline destructive, is that if you grew up in a home, where, you know, your family of origin, thought that being sad, or being angry was not okay. Like, those were emotional states that were like any not good perceived as negative. Sure. Yeah. And think about it, too. Like, even if you're at home and you have kids, it's possible, like when you see your son or your daughter who's sad, you think, okay, we need to do something here to try to get something off the side. Yeah, like being sad is bad. Yeah, right. Or being mad is bad. And those ideas of judging those emotions, if you only have these big three, it really leaves you with only one emotion to experience. That's okay. Yeah. And that's happiness. Yeah. And the problem becomes, and we've all experienced this, is that you start to judge your life based on I'm not happy, I should be happy. If I'm not happy, there's something wrong with me. If I'm sad all the time, there's something wrong with me. And this is what happens when your vocabulary about emotions, your knowledge about emotions is very limited, is you end up in this place where you only have a certain two or three emotions you can label because you don't have the knowledge. And then you're like, Well, I'm certainly not happy. So that gives me only a default of Saturday angry. Yeah, well, I guess I'm kind of a mix of them.

Kate MacDougall
Yeah. And, you know, statistically speaking, you're going to be more in the negative perceived emotions than in the happy state. Because while there's more of them, right, so you're definitely going to find yourself there more often. And that's just going to play into this vicious circle of like, well, I'm never happy. Let's wait.

Eric MacDougall
Are you saying that there's more like emotions that cause discomfort than emotions that don't cause discomfort?

Kate MacDougall
Only a few No, happy, sad, mad,

Eric MacDougall
I guess. Yeah. In that case, yeah. No,

Kate MacDougall
but if you know, if you have a more expensive vocabulary, I would say it's 5050. Yeah, I'm saying there's some there's 50% of the emotions that cause good feelings, and 50% of the emotions that cause more uncomfortable feelings, right? That that feel more uncomfortable in your body. But sometimes, we don't even realize it. But some emotions feel the exact same way like excitement feels, for most people. Exact same way. As anxiousness as as nervousness. Yeah,

Eric MacDougall
and one of the things that we talk a lot about, you know, the coaching you and this is still a trigger for me, and I got to kind of deal with this on my own, but it still bothers me when I hear people talk about these subjects and talk about like, well, if you're always feeling negative emotions, and I get like relabeling them to understand, but it really bothers me that it's like, hey, being angry is not negative. Yeah, like so comfortable. It's probably impacting your body. You know, the actions you take when you're angry. That will impact you blow around you write again, if you're angry and you're punching out your neighbors all the time. Well, that's probably unhealthy and negative. Yeah, like that's a negative impact. Yeah. But being angry, feeling angry is not wrong or bad. It's a sign that your body's telling you, like, hey, we need to pay attention here because something's off.

Kate MacDougall
Yeah. And I love that, you know that, that you're saying that because I think that when you feel an emotion, you should see it as as whether it's an emotion that feels good in your body, or an emotion that feels more negative, I think it's more more uncomfortable. I think it's definitely important that when you're feeling something in your body to stop and notice it, right. And that's the whole point behind meditation is noticing, stopping and being able to notice things. And when you're able to stop and notice whether it's a good feeling like oh my gosh, I just got butterflies in my stomach right now. Like, I wouldn't know what's going on for me like, and then having being able to name that feeling in your body. I have butterflies in my stomach. I wonder what that is. And then being able to say, oh, that might be nervousness, or that might be excitement? Or that might be you know,

Eric MacDougall
oh, yeah, like all kinds of

Kate MacDougall
things. admiration, yeah, all of these beautiful words that you probably wouldn't think about if because, unfortunately, that happy emotion is not an emotion that lasts very long and kind of comes and goes in your body a lot faster.

Eric MacDougall
That's probably a good description of what you're feeling.

Kate MacDougall
Yeah, right. But it comes and goes that in your body a lot faster than an uncomfortable feeling. Oftentimes, what happens is, when you get an uncomfortable feeling, we stop and focus and notice that one, because we're like, I don't feel good. Don't like this. My stomach hurts. Everything hurts. I'm tired all of a sudden, like, you're bigger, you know, feelings come in. And then you're like, wow, like, this feels uncomfortable. What's going on for me? And then you're like, Oh, I'm sad or mad?

Eric MacDougall
Well, and also, like, a lot of times, we don't even do that. We don't even stop and say what's going on? For me to say I'm uncomfortable. Let me check out the screen on my phone. Let me randomly look at Yeah, let me let me turn on the TV. Or let me go to the fridge and eat some sugar. And this is really important, right? Because when you when you think about the steps to this, so we really want to re emphasize this idea that gaining more knowledge about emotions is very powerful, not only for your life, but like in relationship, right? Because what happened in our relationship is, you know, when Kate only had the knowledge of like, these three emotions, you know, happy, sad, mad, she would look at me. And if I wasn't happy, Kate's like something's wrong. Yeah, Eric's either. Sad. He doesn't seem look sad. So he's mad. And those are the only things so when I was quiet, or contemplative, or thinking or in deep thought or calm, you know, Kate would like get uncomfortable. Yeah, sure. Like, something's wrong here. Yeah. Because Eric, like, the only time that I'm comfortable is when I can guarantee that Eric's happy. Yeah, and this is kind of what's happening. Because we're able to now expand our language around emotions, you know, okay, it's like you don't Okay, I'm like, I'm feeling really calm. Yeah,

Kate MacDougall
I'm feeling content. Content is an amazing emotion to feel. I mean, you're, you're, you know, whelmed, right, everything is just going well, and your content, but when you're content, you're not walking around with a giant smile on your face, you know, singing Looney Tunes, like, you're like, just there, you know, and, and so, I before would perceive that as a negative emotion, like, oh, my gosh, or something's wrong and negatives is not as bad. And then, you know, but had I taken the time to, you know, understand myself, and understand that sometimes when I have positive things that I seem, that I perceive as more positive as more uplifting in my body. I'm not smiling. I'm not jumping around. I'm not all giddy. But I'm still, you know, in that happy state. You know, I'm lightness to it. Yeah, exactly.

Eric MacDougall
Yeah. I think one of the things that I often you know, we teach this to men, but like, first you want to talk about this idea of mindfulness, we use these words like mindfulness embodiment, this kind of talking about. So mindfulness, this idea is like, separating yourself from your thoughts. Yeah. Right. And so this is a big thing that people can't do. Like, they think that their thoughts are just reality,

Kate MacDougall
right, a natural thing for people to do. And you have to train your mind to do it. Yeah.

Eric MacDougall
But you also have to understand that, like, my thoughts are not reality. I've 50,000 thoughts a day. Yeah, you're gonna mean, and they come and go. So yeah, and that's not like real. You know, sometimes I think about things. And I'm like, Why did I think that thing, you know what I mean, that's not true. That's not real. But if I believe that all my thoughts are real, then that's like, catastrophic. And so this idea of mindfulness, you know, being able to separate myself from my thoughts. So okay, this is my brain. My brain has a bunch of thoughts, then I can decide from a separate space and say, Okay, I'm gonna choose to think about this. I'm gonna choose not thinking about this. That's true. That's not true, etc, right? Then the other part of it, which is embodiment, which is you're talking about, which is like, can I actually connect to my body and understand what's going on? Right? Hmm, it's kind of weird. My breathing is quickened, my teeth are clenching my drawers clenching, My fists are getting tight. Yeah, that's like you're able to sit there and, like, connect to your body. And you're starting to understand it. How many times you know, we talked about this the other day, we were watching a show. And the scene of the show was so intense. So right, that like, when the scene was done, I think the show had ended a like a cliffhanger. We both like, let out a big breath. Yeah, like you'll let out. But then then recognizing in that moment, right, like, we kind of laughed about it, we're like, wow, that was intense. But also, can we just talk about how like, our bodies just stopped breathing, they're

Kate MacDougall
probably right and healthy? Well, because

Eric MacDougall
like the stress of the show, like it was bringing up feelings in us, but then told her body be ready here, because something's about to happen, right. And so like, that was like the fight or flight mechanism. So we're like, we don't need to waste our time breathing.

Kate MacDougall
Right. So the beauty of recognizing more emotions, the beauty of recognizing what those emotions feel like in your body, helps you communicate much clearer, much clearer, yep, much more clearly, more clearly, with your spouse or with other people in your life. So you know, and I encourage you to do this, that not only when it's a uncomfortable feeling, not only when it's a feeling where you feel you need help, but to communicate. And I just, there's something that happened, I went out with some friends the other day, and I just, I admired it so much. And I was like, I want to do that more often. And it was this, this girl, one of my co workers was there with her boyfriend, husband, no different partner, call them whenever you will. But she just spent the whole time like, every time like, we were talking about shows, or you're watching and she'd say, Oh, my partner, he's so good at finding shows. Like he's amazing. Like, he's so great. He's so good at finding shows, like, we'll just turn something on, he'll be like, Oh, this looks good. And it's always so good. And it was just like, every little thing people would say she would just like have this really nice thing to say about her partner. And I was like, It's so refreshing. It is so refreshing, because a few sentences. Before that, I was having another conversation with a couple of other, you know, on the other side of the room with a couple of other friends. And they were, you know, we were talking about how our boyfriends were sold like this. And then and then our husbands are like that. And it was like, you know, kind of like this bitch session about them. And it was very like, when that's our that's usually our go to method is to connect with people to talk about frustrations to talk about, like, Hey, how's it going? Now? Good. And all of these things, and blah, blah, blah, and go on and on. But how many times you actually stop and say like, I feel so good right now. Like, all of these wonderful things are going on in my life. And it's just amazing. Like, like that coworker. Like it was so nice. I was just like, oh my gosh, because I told her the next day at school, I was like, you, you're so cute with your partner. Like that was so cute. So it's like, I think we need more of that in our lives. And I think the more we model it, the more you know, our partner, it'll uplift our partner because whether or not you want it, it's going to be contagious. Like if I go up to you, and I'm like, and you're like, Hey, how are you feeling? And I'm like, actually, I feel really good. Like I feel just so content right now like my heart so light. I was looking at the kids out on the trampoline and all these nice things like you're gonna catch that feel like you're gonna catch that? Of course. Yeah. Regulate. Yep. And so I think like focusing Yes, on the on the emotions, I feel really good and being able to talk about them and share them, well then help your partner understand. What is it that makes you tick? What is it that makes you content? What is it that's making you happy? And in that moment, being able to name that specific emotion, you know, I'm feeling I'm feeling I can't even think of words right now have different feelings,

Eric MacDougall
because I want to jump into because I hear a lot, right, this grievance of like, and I'm sure people who are listening to this are like, yeah, that would be great. But my partner is public law. And I often challenge people that I work with, or individuals who are in relationship with a partner, maybe, who has more of a like a glass half full kind of approach to life, right? Again, like it's not judging them, like we need people like that we need people who maybe are a little more cautious and a little more wary of things that could cause pain, like that's actually important for society. But oftentimes, you know, we're like, Well, I'd love to be more positive, but my partner just keeps being negative all the time. Right. And my first response is like, so what, like, you know what I mean? Like essentially like you're saying that because you're negative you have to be negative. Like what if you just like said while you're going to be negative and I honor like a you're gonna be Negative, whatever, not I don't say negative, but like, you're gonna have this experience of life. And I'm gonna let you have this experience of life. And you're like, you describe it, I mean, knowledge it, validate it. And then I'm gonna talk about my experience of life. And

Kate MacDougall
I'm not gonna stop myself from feeling great feelings and from talking about all those great feelings,

Eric MacDougall
but it's like this feeling that we get, like sucked into the negativity and occasionally, but what if you could be positive, and the light was so bright, you know, you could shine so bright as lighthouse, that like, then that would actually attract your partner to move into that.

Kate MacDougall
Exactly. And maybe it might take time, for sure. It might take time. And I know, there's some days where you come up to me and I'm like, rah, rah, rah, Everything's bad, blah, blah, blah. And you're like, everything's great in my life. But I'm like, like, go after yourself. Like, you don't say it in that way. Because you had less heart, a little more less heartless in that, but, but it's yeah, it's tough when you're when your spouse is always, blah, blah, blah, rah, rah rah, like, yeah, it's hard for you to be that light. But there's a way to do it. That's, that's, you know, kind and you know, doesn't invalidate your validate them. Like, I'm really sorry, you had a bad day, and I'm sorry, all these things happened. I'd love to share something great that happened with me today, maybe it'll lift you up, you know, saying in in that way, but also, you know, when when I'm feeling a feeling that's a little more heavy, that doesn't feel as good in my body. It helps to not be alone in that feeling. It helps to talk about it. It helps to, you know, share it with my partner. And by understanding you know, exactly what is as I'm feeling, feeling despair right now. I'm feeling deep fear, you know, instead of saying sad or angry, like, I'm feeling overwhelmed. I'm feeling despair. I'm feeling fear. I'm feeling whatever the

Eric MacDougall
even like stressed, yeah, people don't say that. I'm feeling stressed. Yeah,

Kate MacDougall
right, then then it can give your partner kind of a hint of what it is you might need in that moment. You know, like, Oh, you're feeling fear? Like, is there anything I can do to help support you during this? Or, you know, maybe, maybe I'm your fear, okay, I'll stand here with you. I'll stand here with you. And I'll hold your hand. Like, we're saying, you know, what is it that you need from me when you feel fearful? And having those specific words to describe your feelings, really helps you be more clear, more precise as to what you need when you feel that feeling? Yeah.

Eric MacDougall
And I think there's a lot of science behind this, right? It's important to kind of on this last point that you're saying, when we label our emotion, what actually happens to our mind, right? So it actually hooked people up to machines and look at their minds. And what actually happens is your mind calms itself when you're able to label the experience you're having. So this is why like, I even say, like, when you're able to label your partner's emotions, instead of fix fixing your partner's on the coming home. They're having a bad day, like, Oh, God, such a shitty day, blah, blah. And you're able to just say, Oh, you sound really frustrated. Yeah, that's actually going to calm them. Yeah, because they're gonna save room. And there it is. Yeah. Right. And they're gonna essentially feel like, that's what's in my body. So now my brain is gonna be like, Okay, I know what this is. I don't need to freak out anymore.

Kate MacDougall
Yeah, and they say, to do that with kids. But, you know, why did we stop doing in adulthood? If I did we stop naming other people's emotions, you know, not labeling them. But it seems like you're feeling? Yeah, you don't want to label your partner. Wow, you look bad. Or Wow, you look like you're, you're really you look, you want to label the emotion. But you want to say it seems like you're feeling I guess x

Eric MacDougall
and then allow them to respond with yes or correct. You examine if they correct you. That's great. Yeah. Because by them correcting you. They label their emotion. Exactly. So I'm not I'm not frustrated. I'm just annoyed. Oh, wow.

Kate MacDougall
Tell me more about that. Yeah. Yeah. No, I love that. And I think that, you know, the first step here really, is to really start understanding your own emotional experience. To really start noticing naming. Go on Google, right emotional, we'll emotional feelings, we'll whatever you you'll find it looks like a giant drops. And you can yeah, there's amazing websites you can go on. And start learning to label emotions printed out, have it out in plain sight. And when you're feeling something, just go just go look at it like Oh, I wonder what it is. I'm feeling there's even a website, we were on it earlier, that actually tells you what that feeling usually feels like in your body. Yeah, so it's so interesting. And like, just get to know yourself. Get to know what an emotion looks like in your body and what you can name that emotion, when you can name that feeling. So that you can then become more aware of the way you're feeling and be able to be clear with your partner and be specific about your needs and desires. And that you can, you know, communicate what it is that you want or what it is that you're you would help you in that Woman Yeah,

Eric MacDougall
I think that's a really great way to kind of wrap it up. And just this whole idea of continuing to evolve your own emotional intelligence, and really start to focus on this idea of emotional granularity, which is get more specific than kind of those three or four basic emotions.