Understanding Emotions - 1 - LOVE AND LOVE ALONE ....

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UNDERSTANDING EMOTIONS . Swami Tejomayananda

 

 

 

Mostly, everyone is familiar with the evaluation of IQ (Intelligence

Quotient), but in the last few years there has also been a great

deal of talk about EQ, the Emotional Quotient! I am not too familiar

with all the literature available on this topic, but I do know that

we all have emotions and they affect us everyday. When we observe

our lives closely we notice three aspects to it; action, emotion

(feeling), and thought. We may consider these aspects as being

separate but actually they are not, for there cannot be any action

without thought and feeling. However, for the purpose of analysis we

separate them and say that at the physical level there is action, at

the mind (heart) level there is emotion, and at the intellectual

level there is thought. Yet we know that action is not only at the

physical level, since mental and intellectual activity takes place

along with each physical act. And even though thinking and emotions

are at the thought level the texture of each is a little different.

We know that thinking is not the same as feeling for each has to

different effect. For example, there are people who are highly

intellectual, they speak and write very logically, yet they often

fail to touch the hearts of other people. There are some who perform

spectacular acts yet their actions do not really affect anyone.

While some people appear to do very little, somehow those little

actions touch people's hearts. We see the same with music, a

musician may present a technically perfect piece of music yet be

unable to delight the hearts of the listeners while a simple

rendition with intense feeling may move everyone.

 

 

 

Thus what we refer to as emotions, feelings and attitudes are all at

the emotional level -- at the level of our hearts -- and they have

an important role to play. In fact, feelings are involved in all our

thoughts and actions. One may wonder if people are generally more

emotional or rational. It is my feeling that we are essentially more

emotional. Even those who consider themselves rational and

scientific, also have their emotional side, sometimes to the point

of being quite unreasonable. We see that they also have their own

pet theories and have great attachment to them. This is why

fanaticism is found not only among some religious groups but it is

also seen among people in science, politics and economics.

 

Gopi Krishna <gopi