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Currently viewing the tag: "emotions"
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The things that really make people fuming mad tend to be things that we can rarely speak up about without blowing the problem out of proportion. This is why people are so glad to vent their anger when anyone brings up petty offenses. They’re finally in a situation when they can express the full frustration they feel. Everyone has had experience with these kind of minor irritations, so outrage over relatively minor stuff becomes huge. That outrage, of course, doesn’t solve the problem. -Esther Inglis-Arkell
Fiction Writing Prompt: Add to your character sketch. What is your character really angry about? What are the minor annoyances that he or she talks about instead?
Journaling Prompt: What are you angry about that you can’t talk about?
Art Prompt: Outrage over Petty Offenses
Non-Fiction / Speechwriting Prompt: How do you blow off the steam that builds up because you can’t effectively deal with your deepest issues? Give your audiences some strategies they can use.
Photo Credit: joshjanssen on Flickr
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Her doctor once explained the disease as a wall around a person’s memories, and the brain simply can’t get to them. The mind knows the memories are there, but they can’t be seen, read, felt, touched, or heard. So when Mom feels an emotional response to something that’s a memory, she reacts with anger and frustration because she can’t get through or over that wall. -Raymond Benson, The Black Stiletto
Fiction Writing Prompt: Write a story, scene, or poem from the point of view of a person with dementia.
Journaling Prompt: Write about your experience with someone who has dementia.
Art Prompt: Memory Wall
Non-Fiction / Speechwriting Prompt: Write an informative piece about being a caregiver for someone with dementia.
Photo Credit: | spoon | on Flickr
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“Then, when the itch is gone, when the vendetta is ended and there’s no one left to hate anymore, there’s nothing left inside of you but this little dried up husk of what was once a soul. And then you die, Richard. Because you’ve become the hate, and when the hate dies there’s nothing left of you.” -David Brown, The Bet
Fiction Writing Prompt: Write a story, scene, or poem about the effects of hatred.
Journaling Prompt: Write about a time when you felt hatred and what happened when you held on to it.
Art Prompt: Hatred
Non-Fiction / Speechwriting Prompt: Inform your audience about the effects of hatred on the soul.
Photo Credit: AngelBeat on Flickr
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Be careful whom you help, Sara. They never forgive you for it. – Consuelo Saah Baehr, Best Friends
Fiction Writing Prompt: Write a scene inspired by this line.
Journaling Prompt: Write about an experience you had when someone you helped got angry with you for it.
Art Prompt: Ingratitude
Non-Fiction / Speechwriting Prompt: Write about the paradox of people being angry for receiving help.
Photo Credit: La Chance0925 on Flickr
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Researchers wrote that “making amends can facilitative forgiveness, but not all amends can fully compensate for offenses.” Apology may be needed to repair damage fully, but it may be a “silent forgiveness,” while restitution without apology may lead to a “hollow forgiveness” in which the offenders are treated better but not necessarily forgiven.
“The results suggest that if transgressors seek both psychological and interpersonal forgiveness from their victims, they must pair their apologies with restitution,” they wrote. “Apparently, actions and words speak loudest in concert.” -Science Daily
Fiction Writing Prompt: Write a scene between characters who have both offended against each other who struggle to find forgiveness.
Journaling Prompt: Write about your experience with forgiveness, apologies, and restitution.
Art Prompt: Forgiveness
Non-Fiction / Speechwriting Prompt: Inform your audience about how to apologize.
Photo Credit: Sherif Salama on Flickr
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Gullhaugen found few significant differences between psychopaths and her “normal” group when, in her own study of Norwegian prisoners, she examined the ability to experience a wide range of emotions. The differences that she found showed that psychopaths generally experience more negative emotions, such as irritability, hostility, and shame. But they do not feel guilty.
“They have more primitive emotions such as anger and anxiety,” says Gullhaugen. “This is what I found in the studies I conducted of strong psychopathic individuals who had committed serious criminal acts.”
When it comes to more positive feelings, however, there was little or no difference, suggesting that the psychopath’s emotional life is more nuanced than first thought. -Science Daily
Fiction Writing Prompt: Create a scene with a psychopathic character Contrast his emotional reactions with the reactions of the other people in the scene.
Journaling Prompt: Keep a running list of the emotions you feel today. If there are any unusual emotions, make a note as to why you felt them.
Art Prompt: Emotional Life of Psychopaths
Non-Fiction / Speechwriting Prompt: Inform your audience about the balance of emotions present in humans.
Photo Credit: Sebastian Anthony
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Research by Kniffin and Wansink measured the amount of jealousy reported by current romantic partners if one of them were contacted by an ex lover and subsequently engaged in several food- and drink-based activities.
“We consistently found that meals elicit more jealousy than face-to-face interactions that do not involve eating — such as having coffee,” Kniffin said. “These results are consistent for both men and women.”
For couples who are attuned to relationship risks, this study suggests that men and women who “do lunch” run the risk of a jealous spouse or partner at home.
“It’s key to remember that from your spouse’s perspective, it’s not ‘just lunch.’ While meals can strengthen social relationships, they can also destroy them,” Wansink said. -Science Daily
Fiction Writing Prompt: Write an arugment between two characters after one of them has had lunch with an ex.
Journaling Prompt: If you have an ex, write about how you balance that relationship with your current relationship.
Art Prompt: Lunch with an Ex
Non-Fiction / Speechwriting Prompt: Inform your audience about strategies for balancing past and present relationships.
Photo Credit: Ed Yourdon on Flickr
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The common responses to celebrity deaths demonstrate important realities about how people build relationships with the media they consume, according to a Kansas State University cognitive psychologist. Richard Harris, professor of psychology, has studied a number of aspects of the psychology of mass communication. His focus has been on how people acquire knowledge from media. Among his studies has been an examination of how watching certain media with different people influences the experience. He has also studied how people remember certain media experiences.
Harris says many people develop relationships with media characters in a similar manner to how they do so in real life. This phenomenon is referred to as parasocial interaction. The one-sided relationship is most commonly observed between celebrities and their fans…
Spontaneous displays of grieving after the death of a famous person or celebrity are not new. For example, impromptu memorials appeared for Princess Diana, Michael Jackson and John Lennon following their deaths.
Harris said these losses have a distinct difference from the loss of a family member. “We don’t have the social structures and support for grieving the loss of a media character or, in particular, a fictional character,” Harris said. “Somebody’s real upset that their favorite soap opera character was killed off yesterday and they tell someone about that and they laugh. It’s a very different reaction than if their grandmother had died.” -Science Daily
Fiction Writing Prompt: Write a story about the death of a celebrity and the world’s reaction to it. Put in a surprise twist.
Journaling Prompt: Write about how you react to the death of celebrities.
Art Prompt: Celebrity Death
Non-Fiction / Speechwriting Prompt: Write about the obsession with celebrity and how it affects culture.
Photo Credit: Cain and Todd Benson on Flickr
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If you look carefully, you will find people all around you who show few signs of life. They haven’t flatlined yet, but they stopped singing long ago. Rarely do their hearts race in excitement over the possibilities held by a new day. They lurch through the darkness like zombies, clinging to memories of what life used to be. But deep inside they long to live again. —Ken Davis, Fully Alive
Fiction Writing Prompt: Write a story about someone who is apathetic, then has an experience that brings them fully alive again.
Journaling Prompt: Have you ever been close to metaphorically flatlining? What brought you out of it?
Art Prompt: Flatliner
Non-Fiction / Speechwriting Prompt: Challenge your audience to break through any apathy they are feeling to become fully alive.
Photo Credit: stefg74 on Flickr
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Human emotions are highly contagious. Seeing others’ emotional expressions such as smiles triggers often the corresponding emotional response in the observer. Such synchronization of emotional states across individuals may support social interaction: When all group members share a common emotional state, their brains and bodies process the environment in a similar fashion. -Science Daily
Fiction Writing Prompt: Write a scene where someone’s emotions become contagious and affects other people.
Journaling Prompt: Write about your experiences sharing smiles with strangers.
Art Prompt: Contagious emotions
Non-Fiction / Speechwriting Prompt: Write about how emotions are contagious and challenge your audience to use this information to change their environment.
Photo Credit: notsogoodphotography on Flickr
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