Thursday, June 4, 2015

Wise people do not always speak wise words

Someone recently told me that emotions should be independent of experiences.
I was immensely confused by this statement, and I don't remember exactly what he said to me after I expressed this, but it was something with the general undertone of: "of course you have a hard time understanding this concept".
Initially, I took offense by this response. So I tried desperately to understand in order to prove him wrong.

But here's the thing: even after trying and trying and goddamn trying to wrap my head around this, keeping an open mind, and working out how this could be a useful way to live life... I still disagree.

Logic and emotions are separate; we often use this to justify weird things.
I mean, say you have a gut feeling about someone, and even though logically you should trust her, you find you don't because of this feeling.
Or love (ugh) is another one. Sometimes you fall in love with someone who logically you shouldn't be attracted to, and yet you can't help being head-over-heels with heart eyes bugging out of your head like a cartoon.

These are emotions. They can't be controlled.

And how demanding do you have to be of life to think this way? I thought I was a control freak, but this to me sounds like something that would take a lot of power... and can you truly enjoy power? Does it make you happy?

Emotions are freeing. They're what bring any sort of color to our lives. Sometimes you are uncontrollably happy and you feel on top of the world! And sometimes you are down and you feel like you can't sink lower but then surprise!, you do...

Most of the time, you aren't experiencing one extreme or the other, yet there's an artful beauty that you're capable of these emotions (however exhausting they might be). I DO believe that emotions are (and should be) based on experiences. And I think that's wonderful and beautiful and tragic and horrifying: that's exactly why life is worth living.

Can you imagine if you were able to control your emotions? Everything would feel the same all the time, and would thus become neutral. That sounds terrifying.

So what I've learned from this whole ordeal is that wise people do not always give wise advice. I mean, he's probably content all the damn time. And maybe that sounds like a good thing to you, but to me it sounds rather boring.


This week's Weekly Distraction

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