underfeeling

/ˈʌndəfiːlɪŋ/

Etymology

From under- + feeling.

underfeeling means A secondary or subconscious feeling. Lexicurio rates it Sui generis — a strength score of 88 out of 100.

Why this word is great

UNDERFEELING — [Noun] A secondary, underlying, or subconscious emotional state. From the English prefix under- (denoting something lower, secondary, or underlying) + feeling (an emotional state or reaction). Unlike overfeeling, a dominant emotional flood, or subtext, an intellectual substrate, an underfeeling is the unexamined emotional silt settling beneath the conscious stream. It is the quiet envy beneath a sincere compliment, the subterranean pulse of dread under a placid morning, the ghost of old grief that tints a joyous occasion—the deep current that determines the true climate of the soul, while the surface is busy with weather.

noun

A secondary or subconscious feeling.“‘It is from a more general cause: simply an underfeeling I have that at the most propitious moment the distance to the possibility of sorrow is so short that a man's spirits must not rise higher than mere cheerfulness out of bare respect to his insight.’”