Why Being Emotional Is More Important Than Ever
Emotions get a bad rep particularly with men. What is lacking in the realm of emotions is context and perspective. The emotions and feelings we have are not only important but necessary. A paradigm shift is necessary in order optimize our relationships with ourselves and others and our lives in general.
Humans have evolved to be the species we are largely because of our ability to in fact be emotional. Our status as a social species is predicated upon our ability to form bonds and these bonds are formed through our complex emotional constitution. In essence, our ability to be emotional. When we refer to emotions it must be made clear that there are two groups of emotions we work around. We have our creative emotions of love, joy, compassion, empathy and we have our survival emotions of anger, fear, anxiety, envy and examples of both types.
Our area of focus has to be on our creative sets of emotions. These are the emotions that let us build the healthy bonds that work to help us. Our survival emotions are also necessary for our survival but too often our signals get crossed and we can form bonds using our survival emotions and apply them where they are more of a liability than an asset. It is my fear of harm that enables me to run like Usain Bolt from a bear in the woods should I encounter one if I were camping. It is my love for my mother that powers me to care for her while she battles Alzheimer's disease. But many times we can misapply our emotions and mix up our categories. There is no reason for me to fear criticism or failure with the same intensity of being attacked by a lion but experiments have shown heart rates elevate to that level just off of thoughts alone when no threat is present. Equally damaging is applying love to an inanimate object or a person who may not have our best interests in their heart.
The root word of emotion is the Latin word mot. It means to move. Emotions initiate us to action and it is necessary for ignition. The proper application is key and this takes time. Emotions connect us in a way we are unaware of. This process is called synchronization. It's why we can picture ourselves experiencing the same moment our favorite athlete experiences when we watch them do something heroic. It's why we become enthralled when we hear a speaker say something that touches us. It's why musicians and singer hold such a high place in just about every society on the the planet.
Technology and our preferred modes of communication are actively working against this process and many of us may not even be aware of it. Texting is a dumb down form of communication. Too many things are lost in translation and it doesn't help us to connect in a healthy manner. We need to have more in person conversations. We are wired to transmit and receive tone. Thirty-eight percent of what is received in communication in via our tone. We are wired to read someone's eyes and their body language. We are wired to read smiles and other facial expressions. We absorb all this information and emotionally categorize it. Communication is largely emotional for us.
When we hear someone refer to someone as too emotional it is usually in the context of a criticism or a put down. I strive to operate from that space where we compliment someone for in fact being emotional because many good thing come from us being able to operate more from our creative space than our survival space.
Humans have evolved to be the species we are largely because of our ability to in fact be emotional. Our status as a social species is predicated upon our ability to form bonds and these bonds are formed through our complex emotional constitution. In essence, our ability to be emotional. When we refer to emotions it must be made clear that there are two groups of emotions we work around. We have our creative emotions of love, joy, compassion, empathy and we have our survival emotions of anger, fear, anxiety, envy and examples of both types.
Our area of focus has to be on our creative sets of emotions. These are the emotions that let us build the healthy bonds that work to help us. Our survival emotions are also necessary for our survival but too often our signals get crossed and we can form bonds using our survival emotions and apply them where they are more of a liability than an asset. It is my fear of harm that enables me to run like Usain Bolt from a bear in the woods should I encounter one if I were camping. It is my love for my mother that powers me to care for her while she battles Alzheimer's disease. But many times we can misapply our emotions and mix up our categories. There is no reason for me to fear criticism or failure with the same intensity of being attacked by a lion but experiments have shown heart rates elevate to that level just off of thoughts alone when no threat is present. Equally damaging is applying love to an inanimate object or a person who may not have our best interests in their heart.
The root word of emotion is the Latin word mot. It means to move. Emotions initiate us to action and it is necessary for ignition. The proper application is key and this takes time. Emotions connect us in a way we are unaware of. This process is called synchronization. It's why we can picture ourselves experiencing the same moment our favorite athlete experiences when we watch them do something heroic. It's why we become enthralled when we hear a speaker say something that touches us. It's why musicians and singer hold such a high place in just about every society on the the planet.
Technology and our preferred modes of communication are actively working against this process and many of us may not even be aware of it. Texting is a dumb down form of communication. Too many things are lost in translation and it doesn't help us to connect in a healthy manner. We need to have more in person conversations. We are wired to transmit and receive tone. Thirty-eight percent of what is received in communication in via our tone. We are wired to read someone's eyes and their body language. We are wired to read smiles and other facial expressions. We absorb all this information and emotionally categorize it. Communication is largely emotional for us.
When we hear someone refer to someone as too emotional it is usually in the context of a criticism or a put down. I strive to operate from that space where we compliment someone for in fact being emotional because many good thing come from us being able to operate more from our creative space than our survival space.
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