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What if your emotions are not problems to fix but a precision navigation system that evolved to keep you alive, connected, and learning? We dive into core feelings as the body’s fast meaning-makers, showing how they tag what matters long before your thinking brain catches up.

We start with a vivid contrast: plants don’t move, so they don’t need to decide. Animals do, and movement floods life with decisions about safety, energy, and opportunity. That’s where psychologist Silvan Tomkins’ affect theory shines—core feelings are the spotlight of the mind, pushing some moments into awareness while letting others fade. From survival and social bonding to curiosity and mastery, these affects bias us toward three essential outcomes that shape every choice and memory.

Then we flip a common belief: feelings aren’t triggered by content but by patterns of intensity over time. Think music, not single notes. A gradual rise invites interest, a sudden spike triggers startle or fear, persistent high levels become distress and then anger, and a decrease brings relief and joy. Through everyday scenes—a car alarm, a delayed text, a quiet room—we map all nine core feelings, including the social nuance of shame, the boundary wisdom of disgust and dismell, and the rewarding pull of interest and joy. Along the way, we reveal how interpretation can create these intensity patterns even when nothing changes outside you, and how body state and context shift your emotional landscape.

To make it practical, we share a weekly challenge to spot the build, the spike, the persistence, and the release in real time; to trace whether the source is external or interpretive; and to find the smallest intervention that makes the pattern more manageable. You’re not turning feelings off—you’re steering with them. If this lens helps you see your inner weather more clearly, follow and subscribe, share this episode with a friend, and leave a review to help others find the show. Curious where you are on your growth journey? Take the free self-discovery snapshot at scottconkrite.com.

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For more information about Scott and his practice, articles, videos, and more: https://linktr.ee/scottconkright