Emotions...

In one of my meditations books, Day by Day - Second Edition: Daily Meditations For Recovering Addicts, I read about emotions and how they can be regulated. I noticed that they essentially said that I am responsible for having the emotions I have and that I can change the emotions nearly at will. This may come as a strange surprise to many people because the more popular notion is that you cannot change your emotions no more than you can change the color of your eyes.

Yet, it is true that our emotions are generated by our thoughts and what we literally think about a person, place, thing, or situation determines the emotion that we experience. Those who dispute this usually point to the emotion of fear and say, "See, there's an emotion that is not dependent on thinking for I am just naturally scared when something frightens me." The trouble with this thought is that the same person, place, thing, or situation may not effect two people the same way, i.e., one may become frightened and another exhilarated by the same event. A thunderstorm is a good example of this: One of us is scared by the sound and fury, and another of us is so happy with it we grab a camera to photograph the lightening bolts. The difference is in the thinking: One assumes they will be struck by the lightening, another that it will never hit them. One cowers, shivering in a corner. Another throws open the doors and dashes out into the rain. It all has to do with thinking.

But, if you take some simpler and less powerful emotions than fear, one might even see the point more clearly. If you believe that the world is a hostile place, where people will humiliate you at the drop of a hat, where embarrassment is everywhere, where you are never truly safe from danger, it is no wonder that you will develop signs of social phobia and feel emotions of uncomfortability, nervousness and fear. If you feel insecure, it is certain that you do not trust others and think they will withdraw their love. If you feel angry, it is certain that you think someone has wronged you. If you feel love, it is certain that you think the other is worthy of your love. The list could go on.

One of the things we do when we do not accept responsibility for what we think is allow ourselves to blame other people for what we feel. "YOU, make me angry", we scream, "This PLACE makes me feels uncomfortable", we moan, and "I hate the SITUATION you placed me in", we cry. Instead, it should be that I make me angry, uncomfortable and tearful because of what I think about the people, places, things and situations in my life.

It is not just the negative emotions that are caused by this process. Like the meditation book says, if we make conditions within ourselves (thinking) healthy, then we will be able to enjoy happiness and joy that will also be a part of our experience. We do this by always being alert to change our thinking so it always reflects reality. It is appropriate to be sad if someone runs over our dog, or a tree falls on our house. But, it is also appropriate to be happy to think that we will get a new dog and that we will fix our roof too. It literally is the old adage of thinking of the glass as being half empty or half full. We can choose how we regard the people, places, things, and situations in our life, and our choice determines our emotions and ultimately our behaviors.

I wrote on February 15, 2010 that I believe the "Acceptance" paragraph in the AA Big Book on page 417 is the only way to live. Because I accept life just the way it is, I recognize that I have to be willing to change me and my thinking in order to be happy and serene. To demand it be any other way is to set myself up for misery. It is so easy to avoid that. All I need to do is have faith in my Higher Power and I will be able to withstand any injustice, weather any storm, suffer any sadness, rejoice at any happiness, and find serenity.

So long as I follow that way, I have nothing to fear.

All the best, Roger W.