Thursday, August 19, 2021
Nature seems unaffected by our emotions, and life seems cruel. Yet people think emotional outbursts will get them what they want or will change an undesired outcome. But the ambivalence of nature is bewildering – it doesn’t cave into your cries. Take death, for example. Death seems so cruel, but it’s not – it’s just naturally inevitable. It takes your loved ones away, despite your anguish. The violence of tornadoes, storms, floods, and volcanic eruptions live side by side with the serenity of glaciers, mountains, valleys, vegetation, and clear skies. How can such an extreme exist in perfect harmony with itself? And how can we learn to live in harmony with the bliss and the dark side of our own, emotional extremes?
As fluid as emotions are, and as powerful as they seem to be, there is something greater to notice within yourself. It’s the mysterious “equalizer” that can see both sides of the extremes. The equalizer within you can tell when your greater sensibilities have been hijacked by your negative emotions. Conversely, you can also notice how impossible it is to remain in the best mood, all of the time. We think emotional outbursts are caused by the provocation of others, or by situations that are not controllable. Emotions seem to have a mind of their own, sloshing around from one extreme to another, and often for no apparent reason! But, we can become more forensically sensitive to our own emotional extremes by taking time to be quiet, to experience moments of non-reaction, and to learn the benefit of experiencing non-thought.
There is an inner, neutral witness that can notice all emotion, and that can notice the randomness and negativity of overthinking. It’s important to remember that you cannot reason with emotions by overthinking, no more than you can reason with nature by over emoting. But you can help the world by becoming a more effectively compassionate person when you realize how difficult the navigation of emotional turmoils can be. We have to see how our behaviors are affected by the ignorance of our own emotions. That’s the only way to present a more loving and sane version of yourself to the world. Life is not cruel, humans are. So let’s start to figure out why and try to do a better job of noticing our own, ineffectual, emotional fickleness.
Start each day by learning something about yourself!