Reflections on the Human Emotions

The role of the emotions in human life is very central. The emotions determined the intimate psychological state of a person. They drive a person to act or inhibit him. They unite persons or cause divisions. When we possess things that we value very much or when evils we fear the most are present, these things bring about very strong emotions. The subjective experience of happiness is very closely related to the way we are aware of the state of our appetites.

In general, we must give a positive value to emotions: they reinforce our tendencies. It is important to say this because there are people who give a negative value to the emotions (Kant and Hegel). These people think that having emotions is proper of weaklings. They think that emotions, because they belong to the sense part of man, are a lowering of what is properly human (which they think is the spirit). To intend that man lives without emotions will end up dehumanizing him. It is kind of stoicism. A man without emotions is dysfuntional.

There is, however, the opposite extreme that tends to give the emotions excessive value. This view gives the emotions the role of completely determining human behavior, making them the criteria for human acts and ends in themselves. This position is called sentimentalism. This is a very common view nowadays especially when it comes to love.

Why is sentimentalism not an adequate and prudent position? The reason is because man’s dominion over his emotions is not total and certain. It is a part of the human psyche that is not always docile to the reason and will because it does not fully belong to that realm. This is a principal characteristic of the emotions: it is like a domesticated cat — it can be tame but it can sometimes go crazy. Aristotle talked about a “political dominion” of the reason over the emotions. The emotions are like free citizens who can be taught to direct their actions towards the service of the city. They need to learn to do this. They may do so but sometimes they might do the contrary. We all have the experience that to dominate an emotion is not the same are commanding our arm to rise.

The emotions can go with or against what a person wants. We cannot control them completely if we have not been determined to do so and have been exerting the effort to do so. The lack of harmony in the emotions can produce psychological, behavioral and moral disorders. The fear of making mistakes can cause inhibition. The fear of gaining weight can cause anorexia.

The appearance or disappearance of the emotions is not totally voluntary. For instance, to “fall in love” is something that more often than not “happens” to a person rather than him willing it to happen. A person does not usually give himself the “order” to fall in love. But at the same time, a person has to control his affectivity. If he already loves a woman, let’s say, his wife, he should control his affections for other women. The same is true with moral pains, for instance, frustration. If it comes, it is something we cannot control, but we cannot allow ourselves to be dominated by it.

One of the great achievements of Plato was to show how the emotions cooperate with the appetites and the will. His practical philosophy, explained in the Republic and Laws, is a study about the best manner of educating man, so that he attains harmony among the different powers of his soul. According to Plato, a great part of this education is to know how to channel and have dominion over the emotions.

The emotions are the great companions of man in his life. The emotions will always remain like little kids. If a person allows them free rein, they can get lost or hurt. The virtue that enables a person to master the emotions is called sophrosyne: moderation, temperance, calm, self-control.

The emotions are irrational in their origin but they can be harmonized with reason. They cannot be ‘rationalized’ except partially only. But in fact, they always accompany our thoughts and intentions. This irrational character of the emotions is the basic reason why not everything in human life is exact and clear cut. There is a very wide margin for imagination and mystery, for the unforeseen and irrationality. Whoever wants to have everything in life well ordered and planned will lose spontaneity and freshness that is a trait of people who give room to the emotions and imagination.

The emotions provide us immediate ‘values’ especially when it has to do with persons. The emotions evoke positive or negative reactions to persons, places or things. This spontaneous evaluations determine our behavior and lead us to go in one direction or in another.

The emotions reinforce our convictions and give our convictions more driving force. When we “feel” strongly about an issue, we become more identified with it and we act in a more determined manner with regard to the issue. For instance, if we are so affected by the freeze in the salary increase, chances are we will not take this event sitting down.

Whoever wants something done passionately will do it better than a person who is not passionate about it. We also have to see what it is we are passionate about. If a person becomes passionate about cars or I-pods, this attitude is rather superficial. A professor who is passionate about his subject matter will be more identified with his teaching and will be a better teacher than a professor who simply mouths his lessons. A lover who is passionate is capable of doing the unthinkable.

To have passion in doing things gives more meaning to life and activities, at least from a biographical point of view. Whoever is passionate about his noble activity and shows the others how passionate he is becomes a model that is very attractive. A passionate person is able to give his life more unity. The passion unites his mind, will, plans, activities, everything in his life. He directs this difference aspects of his life to what he is passionate about. The opposite of being passionate is being indifferent. Indifference makes a person lose the zest for life.

The variety of emotional make-ups in persons produces the variety of characters. A great part of a personality depends on the emotions that a person allows to prevail in him.

a)          The passionate person puts passion and intensity in everything that he does, even if what it is about does not deserve much attention.

b)          The sentimental person lets himself get carried away by the emotions; he allows them to dominate him and so he is shifting and unstable.

c)          The cerebral person is cold and cannot understand the language of the heart; he may even appear inhuman.

d)          The serene person is the one whose emotions take long in coming; since they are more reflective, they are more coherent and less talkative.

e)          The indifferent person is the one who does not have emotions; he does not care, he does not move; he does not goals or ambitions; he does not love.

From what has been said so far, it is clear that a person will be better off if he achieves due proportion between his emotions, reality and the subsequent behavior. It is advisable to avoid extremes: the sentimental and the cerebral. This demands that we be realistic. Self-deception can be present at the root of frustrations: for example when someone overestimates his capabilities or when someone just knows a beloved person only superficially. We can have very strong beliefs and impressions about ourselves and about things. But reality continues to be reality and the realization of the truth can come as a shock.

Errors regarding self estimation can give rise to false expectations and frustrations. A correct perception and estimation of oneself and of reality contributes to balanced and correct reactions. A person who is realistic realizes that he can make mistakes and fail, but he also knows that problems can be solved and he also knows his own capacity to solve his problems. He knows that he can move on. He knows that as long as there is life there is hope.

When a person realizes that he has made an erroneous estimation of the object of his emotion, he usually falls into anger, desire for revenge, despondency or discouragement. A person might have loved too much an object that does not deserve that much love.

Some rules can be brought up in this connection:

a)           Not all things deserve the high degree of emotions we might have about them: too much love, anger, fear, appreciation, etc.

b)          On the other hand, there are other realities that deserve better reactions on our part than what we have towards them. We have to be careful about our first impressions.

c)           When our evaluations and reactions are very sentimental, we have to correct ourselves and rectify. We cannot allow ourselves to be lead by our emotions.

How should we judge our emotions? We can look at the psychic alterations they produce and the behavior they give rise to. An emotion can be volcanic and intense, but such emotions may subside very soon. In this case the emotion may be judged as superficial.

Deep emotions do not disappear that quickly and at times these emotions are not easily apparent. It is possible to be profoundly affected by something without being too “emotional” about it: for instance, love for one’s spouse or fear of impending danger.

One’s behavior can also be a good indicator of one’s emotional states (at times an even better indicator than one’s interior states). When a man avoids his wife and does not pay attention to her, we cannot conclude that there is nothing wrong between him and his wife. When a person tell you he appreciates you but later on, he treats you with indifference, then he is deceiving you. Love and hatred are manifested in one’s actions, more than in one’s words.

Not all emotions have the same value. There is a kind of hierarchy among them. Part of training the emotions is to know how to put order into them and be objective when assessing them. It can happen that one’s fears are unfounded or one’s passions are not reasonable. There are emotions whose objective importance is very little. One should know how to be a little be more detached from the object of the emotion or to practice a little irony with oneself.

Sentimentalism can lead to sadness and failure. To have as criteria for a decision that of having emotions about it is to make our behavior depend on our emotional states. It is a kind of slavery. The emotions have ups and downs: they are fleeting and unstable, especially in some persons. A person should rather behave following the truth as known by the mind and what is good as grasped by the will.

When a person allows himself to be ruled by the emotions, it will be hard for him to achieve excellence. It is different to be passionate about something. To be ruled by emotions is to be ruled by something shifting and unstable. It is to remain a child. Childishness and irresponsibility, delayed adolescence are very common phenomena nowadays.

One’s emotional states are important for one’s behavior, but we should not exaggerate their importance. To give in to sentimentalism produces instability and insecurity in a person’s life.

How are the emotions manifested? One must learn how to manifest the emotions. Though many persons learn to do this spontaneously, not everyone learns to do so. Emotions are manifested in one’s behavior and also in one’s speech. The manifestation of the emotion must be in harmony with the other aspects of a person’s life: his goals, convictions, environment,…There must be some proportion between one’s emotions and the other dimensions of human life.

We discover the importance of gestures in the manifestation of emotions. Gestures are the language of the emotions. There are facial gestures: laughing, crying, smiling, frowning, … There are bodily gestures: standing up, bowing the head, lying prostrate on the ground, closing the fist,… Usually, a person who is rich in gestures is also rich in his emotional life. There are some peoples who communicate very much through gestures: the Italians, for example. We know these people to be sentimental people. The English, on the other hand, are not very given to gestures and they are known to be more serene and unperturbed.

Art is the most sublime way of expressing the emotions. And among the forms of art, music has a privileged position among the channels for expressing emotions. Music has an enormous capacity to evoke and awaken the emotions. One might be unaware of it, but while listening to music, one’s interior state gets altered. Music empowers, accompanies and expresses the emotions. One sings when one is happy. But also when one is sad. Boredom is uniformity, while creativity is symphonic. When a person interiorizes music it is expressed in a song. Singing is perhaps the most beautiful way of manifesting our emotions.

Dynamics of the Emotions

Let us now try to relate all the faculties of the soul. The dynamics of human life, its development, its perfection depend on the harmony that should exist among all the dimensions of the human psyche: the intelligence, the will and the emotions. In this context, by 'harmony' we mean two things: fullness of one's development and interior balance and proportion between each part and the unity of the whole.

The sensitive appetites and the will, aided by the emotions, are orientated towards biological and non-biological ends. For there to be fulfillment in a person, there ought to be coordination among the three: appetites, will and emotions-a coordination that should be steered by reason in such a way that there be no conflicts among them. A successful life, which is the fullness of development of all the human dimensions, requires the harmony of the soul. What takes place in man is a dynamic equilibrium where each faculty accompanies the others empowering and helping each other. A life that is too cerebral and despises the emotional is not harmonious. A life that is given to voluntarism, and not paying attention to reason is not harmonious either. Giving in always to the emotions is also an imbalance in life. There must be equilibrium, harmony and clarity. These are the defining characteristics of classical beauty: the beautiful life.

The best way of achieving this beautiful life is to give to reason the task of taking the command of the other dimensions of human life. The reason is that the intelligence is our superior and distinctive faculty. Reason enables us to be aware of the end and thus is able to give meaning to a person’s entire life. If reason does not reign over a person’s faculties, the appetites and emotions tend to take over his actions producing an imbalance. The balance and measure in a person’s appetites and emotions are provided by reason. These lower faculties do not measure themselves.

There are two ways of understanding the harmony of the soul: from the outside and from within.

Considered from an external point of view, there is balance and harmony in the soul when there is an objective, a goal that unifies all of a person’s faculties. When a person has a predominant goal, an ambition in life, this objective gives direction and meaning to all of his actions, plans, thoughts, desires. When he achieves his goal, he is fulfilled and happy.

Considered from an internal point of view, there is balance and harmony in the soul when a person is reconciled with his own subconscious or what can also be called the “passive synthesis”. Freud thought that the subconscious is that part of the human psyche that is hidden, unconscious and anarchic such that it determines a person’s behavior without his awareness. It is rather the totality of a person’s biological, genetic, psychological and cultural traits, that a person carries with him as he goes through his life. There can exist harmony between the conscious states and the subconscious. This is what all normal persons achieve by means of an adequate process of education.

Nonetheless, the increasing number of psychological disorders in our times just goes to show that this adequate process of education is sometimes lacking. And when it is, there is lack of harmony in the soul and the person ends up getting sick. Psychological balance and harmony depend very much on the adequate control of the appetites and the emotions and the integration of the subconscious into the conscious life of the person.

How does one achieve control over the emotions? One can answer in three ways:

1) One can give a technical answer. Emotional states and the psychic states in general can be controlled through medicine, psychiatry and techniques for mental relaxation. Medicine seeks physical well-being. If we give too much importance to psychiatry we will tend to think that any human problem can be solved through it. People tend to think that the human person is simply a machine that needs some repairs from time to time. Many psychic illnesses have organic bases greater than what was thought of before. Psychiatry more and more depends on biochemistry. The pharmaceutical industry has grown very much in the field of psychiatric drugs. This is the basic reason why people are abandoning the psychoanalytic theories of Freud. His psychiatric techniques do not depend on drugs and their results are long in coming.

Despite the enormous capabilities of modern medicine we must go beyond the merely technical and take into account the personal dimensions. Man is not a machine. He may have personal problems that cannot be cured by pills because their solutions require the intervention of the will and of personal freedom. The internal dispositions of a person cannot be changed by external factors exclusively. In order to cure a person of a psychological illness you have to cure his soul. For this other methods are necessary and the fundamental element of these methods is dialogue. The illnesses of the soul can be cured by the help of drugs and sleep; but also by friendship, the experience of love, the contemplation of the truth, and the fostering of relations with God. The patient must be aware of his own interior kingdom and become the lord of it. The purely technical solution is not suficient to achieve the harmony of the soul.

2) A second solution is to affirm that the control of the emotions is purely a question of the mind and the will. It is enough to have a powerful mind and a resolute will to keep the emotions under control. The philosophers of the enlightenment thought that the problems of man could be solved through rational and abstract science that will enable us to deduce in a logical manner the solutions to man's moral, psychological and social problems. It is a vision of man that tends to undervalue the affectivity, the emotions, of anything that has to do with the body.

In the realm of morality, this position easily leads to rigorist dualism. These people think that to achieve interior harmony by simply fulfilling one's duty, by doing what has to be done. The realm of the senses, they say, should be subject to reason and this, in turn, provides the rules for moral living independent of the sentiments.

There is another extreme one can fall into: voluntarism -- giving to the will the role of putting order and harmony into man's life and faculties. Nietzsche thought that the superior man is the one who is capable of completely dominating his appetites and achieve inner harmony by sheer will power.

These two positions are untenable and ineffective because they are unrealistic. To want to do things on the basis of duty or sheer will power will convince only those who are inflexible, voluntarists, fools and fanatics. We must try to "humanize" the world. Moral behavior, the use of reason, the influence of the will are all valid principles as long as they are principles taken in the context of a real person who is also made of flesh and blood. A person is not a pure spirit or an angel. We are pleased with a smile and a warm handshake. We appreciate a love that is manifested in deeds. To make people act, we have to motivate them and make them happy.

The search for harmony in a person's life must take into account freedom and human weakness. It must regard the reality of the human person.

3) The third possible answer to the question about the harmony of the human soul is that given by classical humanism and Christianity. The answer is the education of the will, the emotions and the appetites.

A person may or may not achieve this education. Christianity tells us that there is a certain disorder in human nature and that is original sin.  This disorder explains why a person falls into a vice if he is not careful or he does not struggle. Inner harmony is attained when a person directs his powers towards a goal that is given by right reason.

Reason gives us the ends for which we act. If we train our powers once and again to reach our right ends we acquire virtue and inner harmony.

What is the norm of this inner harmony? It is moderation. One has to achieve the appropriate emotions, in the adequate manifestations and intensities with respect to the object and circumstances, avoiding excess or defect.

And so, cowardice is excessive fear that can inhibit a person from acting. Rashness is not to fear at all, even when it should be present. Bravery is the middle point: it is to overcome baseless fear at the same time being reasonably careful.

A choleric person is one who gets angry at anything at the least provocation. An indifferent person is one who does not care about any situation. Just indignation is the middle ground: it is to get angry reasonably when there is just cause.

Shamelessness is not being ashamed of anything. Shyness is being ashamed even when one should not be (stage fright). Modesty is to be ashamed in a reasonable way of things one should be ashamed of.

The good life comes about when a person educates his emotions. When the middle ground is attained, the emotions are in harmony with the rest of a person's faculties. The emotions can even help the acts of the other powers, making life beautiful. We usually admire balanced and mature persons, lords of their own lives and rich in emotions.

The science of right acting is ethics. An important part of ethics is the science of educating the emotions. Rationalism and voluntarism have presented ethics as a set of abstract norms that are general and rigoristic.

The vision we have is this: the ethical person must learn to optimize the emotions and appetites, i.e. he must train them to reach their maximum strength and intensity, harmonizing them with his other faculties.

What is beautiful shows balance and harmony. It is complete, not lacking any element that ought to be present. Its parts are orderly in relation to the whole.

Ethics is the way for a person to live a fully human life. To achieve inner balance and harmony is the only way to be truly happy. And the quickest way to attain this is by educating the emotions. And this is part of ethics. To be happy, one has to live ethically. Ethics is not a set of prohibitions but it is the way for a man to be truly a man.