How do you tend to handle big feelings?
Ten questions about the mechanics of a strong feeling — how it arrives, which way it moves you, what you do with it, whether you can name it at the time, and how long it stays.
At the end you get a breakdown across those five things. There is no score, no total and no type. You are not being placed anywhere, and nothing here can tell you whether anything is wrong. Both sides of every dimension are shown, with what each one gives you and what it costs, because the useful part is the description rather than the result.
Ten questions
Answer for an ordinary strong feeling, not the worst one you can remember. If two options both fit, pick the one that happens more often.
Question 1 of 10
Your breakdown, across five dimensions
Five descriptions, not one answer.
Each dimension below shows both directions in full. Where your two answers pointed the same way, that side is marked. Where they did not, nothing is marked and the dimension is left open — which is a real outcome, not a failed one.
What this is and is not
This is a vocabulary exercise. It describes the moving parts of a strong feeling so that you have words for them, and so that you can ask for something specific rather than something general. It is not an assessment, it does not measure anything, and no combination of answers here means anything about your health. There is deliberately no score, because a score invites a threshold and a threshold turns a description into a verdict.
Every one of these ten patterns is ordinary, and most people recognise themselves in several. Where you land can also change with the year, the term, the amount of sleep and the people around you. Read it as a snapshot of how things have been going lately, not as a fact about who you are.
If things feel heavier than a page like this can meet, talking to a person is a reasonable next step: a friend, a GP, or a university counselling service.
Evidence note. The five dimensions here are a descriptive frame, not a validated model. They were chosen because they are things people can observe about themselves and because each one points at a different practical adjustment. No claim is being made that these are the right five, or that they are independent of each other. Treat the write-ups as things many people notice rather than as findings.
Nothing here is saved or sent anywhere. No result is stored, kept or scored. Answers exist only while this page is open, and close when you close the tab.
Written for Thought Club as general guidance, not medical advice. Free to read, print, and share.