Emotion and Feeling
Emotions arise from desires which in turn grow from an awareness that there are still more exciting possibilities ahead on a chosen path. Now the thinking process is activated and objective steps formulated to reach your new goals. You begin to "own" your plan of action, you become committed to it and your desire feeds and grows on your continued thinking.
Strong desires generate a variety of emotions as the imagination conjures up visions of the life after the desire is fulfilled. You develop a strong emotional attachment to the object of your desires which Spurs you ever onwards. The stronger the attachment, the stronger your efforts become.
There are only two possible outcomes:
- You achieve what you set out to do only to realise that there are still more fields ahead to conquer, for which you need to redouble your efforts, or
- You fail to achieve your objectives and give way to despair; repeated failure leads to depression.
QUALITY OF EMOTIONS
At the very basic level, emotions develop from childhood feelings. For example, a baby may be so badly neglected, if not cuddled frequently, that it develops feelings of rejection, which may even lead to death in the cradle due to emotional deprivation.
If the child survived and grew to adulthood, he or she would constantly seek attention - by fair means or foul, the agenda being that it is better to get some attention, good or bad, rather than no attention.
Reviewing some common emotions will help us recognise their manifestations and effects.
Love
The child loves everybody - it will even play affectionately with a snake. It has no motives, prejudices or preferences. Its love is pure and universal, So everybody loves a child of any race or nationality.
In adulthood, love is restricted by self-interest, attachment to family or community or some reasons related to OUT conditioning during growth. It will take a great deal of self-purification and intellectual effort to regain the attitude of universal love. However, when an adult reaches this pinnacle, there is a qualitative difference from the child's unquestioning approach. The adult has re-processed his feelings. re-examined the causes, applied his code of ethics and so on.
He will not embrace a snake being now aware of the danger. But his value system will drive him to prevent cruelty to animals. He has realized that you get love only by giving it. This conclusion is reached by an intellectual process and is different from child's instinctive behavior.
Anger
A child may become angry out of sheer frustration o r reaction to an insult. The motive is to hit back at someone or something and derive satisfaction that he cannot be pushed around. A very s mall child may give vent to his anger by throwing a tantrum. Adults who cannot control their temper have not examined and evaluated their feelings on an intellectual plane. It is not as if the mature adult will never get angry - but he may not exhibit angel' if it is going to have negative effects. However, he may express genuine fee ling of outrage if, for example, some extremely indecent behavior was exhibited. The same emotion of anger is thus different in the immature adult as compared to the child. In the immature adult, the basic childish reaction is only modified on the surface, for example, sulking, throwing things, shouting.
Perfection
The child who lost marks for neatness in an otherwise correct answer paper quickly learnt to draw perfect margins and underlines. As an adult, he may unthinkingly delay a report until he got the spacing and presentation perfect. But if he has developed perceptions about himself through introspection, he would balance his priorities and present the report on time even though it had some handwritten last minute corrections.
Helplessness
The child is forced to adapt to social and moral standards set by his parents. He may rebel at first if forced to go to bed when his favourite TV program is on. But he is helpless against parental authority. In later life, he may tend to be over-compliant, meek and submissive. On the other hand, if he has re-processed his feelings, he can learn to become more assertive and stand up for his rights.
EMOTIONS AND BEHAVIOUR
When your behavior is basically controlled by your emotions, springing from desires and attachments, and even if you interact with people in a socially acceptable manner, there is likely to be an underlying orientation in your thoughts, words and actions, towards fulfilling your hidden agenda of gratifying your own desires.
The mother who loves her son and is deeply attached to him will constantly revert to his achievements even as her friend is trying to extol the virtues of another child. This mother would really like to hear about her own son and may only be listening with half an ear to her friend. This situation may continue until the friend gives up and the mother fulfills her agenda by holding forth about her son. Such behavior may be repetitious to such an extent that her friends avoid
the topic or even avoid her!
Intensity of Emotions
At the first level of intensity of emotions, the resultant behavior is socially acceptable in public. At the second level, the interaction may be secret, confined to only a core group, and ways of damage control may be worked out. At the third level, matters can become serious and end up in a court of Law, the jail or the hospital.
Results of Emotional Behavior
At first you begin to realize or perceive that you lack something in life, there is a vague sense of incompleteness or unfulfilment. This feeling activates the intellect to find ways and means of satisfying the root desire. A stream of thoughts is now generated towards acquiring the object of the desire. As the stream gets stronger, attachment and desire grow. Fulfillment produces joy, and failure results in sorrow. It is, therefore, the interaction of the mind and the intellect that create joy or sorrow.
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