Areas › Focus, starting, and ADHD › Feelings and focus
If rating a feeling out of ten means nothing to you, use something that does. Colour in bubbles, point at a picture, hold your hands apart to show how big it is today.
This began as an adaptation for children, swapping the numbered anxiety ladder for bubbles to colour in, and it is just as useful for anyone who goes blank when asked for a number. The point of a scale is not precision. It is being able to tell today from yesterday. Whatever lets you do that honestly is the right scale for you.
Qur’an and Sunnah
'God does not burden any soul with more than it can bear' (Quran 2:286). Asking of someone only what they can actually manage is the same principle, at a much smaller scale.
لَا يُكَلِّفُ ٱللَّهُ نَفۡسًا إِلَّا وُسۡعَهَاۚ لَهَا مَا كَسَبَتۡ وَعَلَيۡهَا مَا ٱكۡتَسَبَتۡۗ رَبَّنَا لَا تُؤَاخِذۡنَآ إِن نَّسِينَآ أَوۡ أَخۡطَأۡنَاۚ رَبَّنَا وَلَا تَحۡمِلۡ عَلَيۡنَآ إِصۡرࣰ ا كَمَا حَمَلۡتَهُۥ عَلَى ٱلَّذِينَ مِن قَبۡلِنَاۚ رَبَّنَا وَلَا تُحَمِّلۡنَا مَا لَا طَاقَةَ لَنَا بِهِۦۖ وَٱعۡفُ عَنَّا وَٱغۡفِرۡ لَنَا وَٱرۡحَمۡنَآۚ أَنتَ مَوۡلَىٰنَا فَٱنصُرۡنَا عَلَى ٱلۡقَوۡمِ ٱلۡكَٰفِرِينَ
God does not burden any soul with more than it can bear: each gains whatever good it has done, and suffers its bad- ‘ Lord, do not take us to task if we forget or make mistakes. Lord, do not burden us as You burdened those before us. Lord, do not burden us with more than we have strength to bear. Pardon us, forgive us, and have mercy on us. You are our Protector, so help us against the disbelievers.’
Qur’an 2:286read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
What the research says
In a study of people aged 10 to 23 there were age related differences in how strongly emotion was felt and in how well reappraisal could be used, alongside differences in sensitivity to rejection. That is a good reason to fit the tool to the stage the person is at. The study describes those differences rather than testing any particular way of measuring feelings.
Silvers JA, McRae K, Gabrieli JD, Gross JJ, Remy KA, Ochsner KN. (2012). Age-related differences in emotional reactivity, regulation, and rejection sensitivity in adolescence.. Emotion (Washington, D.C.) doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
Why it works
A rating you can actually give is worth more than a precise one you have to guess at.
This one is still a draft. It is waiting on a scholar and a clinician to read it before it is published.
Near this one
Often the feeling fits the situation perfectly and the size of it does not. You were right to be annoyed. The ten out of ten is the part that caused the trouble.
After years of feeling slightly outside every room, pulling back stops being a decision and becomes the setting you live at. Worth knowing about yourself before you conclude that you are simply not a people person.
Sometimes the answer is not a better system. It is doing less, including giving up something you love, because what it costs you has stopped being affordable.