> How would you feel if, instead, I said "your gratitude practice is actually new age hippy trash"?
Directing the putdown "trash" to an idea and presenting it as a subjective opinion ("The rest of it felt like new-age hippy trash") is quite different to applying the putdown "trash" to a person and presenting it as a fact ("your gratitude practice is actually new age hippy trash").
"Felt like" means "It feels like this to me, your experience may be different"
while
"is actually" means "This is objective fact, regardless of how I feel about it".
It's the difference between saying "that idea is idiotic" and saying "you are idiotic".
Directing the putdown "trash" to an idea and presenting it as a subjective opinion ("The rest of it felt like new-age hippy trash") is quite different to applying the putdown "trash" to a person and presenting it as a fact ("your gratitude practice is actually new age hippy trash").
"Felt like" means "It feels like this to me, your experience may be different"
while
"is actually" means "This is objective fact, regardless of how I feel about it".
It's the difference between saying "that idea is idiotic" and saying "you are idiotic".