Reasons for emotional pain and emotions are arbitrary. What mental illness tought me

[CosmicExplorer]

Almost all reasons for emotional pain and emotions are arbitrary. The stronger the mental illness, the more it applies, but it also applies to completely average and normal people. Let me explain what I mean by that

What I mean by that is let's say you feel irritated by something, feel guilt about something, or angry about something, or feel lonely, or anxious about something. Or even positive states like you somehow feel hopeful, energetic, and are in a generally good mood, problems seem very manageable, having a "good day". And in the moment it really feels like you feel guilt because of situation X, but actually, you're just in a guilty mood/lens, and in a guilty mood/lens that you're having right now, tends to skew everything towards feeling guilty about it. If you would be in a different mood, the exact same thoughts would not cause you to feel like that.

Reckful talks about the same phenomena here:

When he's depressed, it seems like he is depressed because he's thinking that everything has no purpose, but it turns out that it's not the reason because when his lens/mood switches to normal or mania, he doesn't mind thinking that everything has no purpose, he still feels happy even when thinking like that.

I've discovered exactly the same thing by doing many experiments on myself. I would be feeling intense anxiety/guilt/anger because seemingly Y reason at the moment, I'd be like "ok let's see, maybe it's truly a reason why I feel like that" and I would set an alarm in 8 days on my phone to check how I would be feeling about that exact Y reason. And 8 days later my phone notification appears, so I check and try to bring exactly the same thoughts that seemingly caused me that feeling, and pretty much every single time it no longer felt like that at all, the same set of information I'm bringing to mind and yet completely different feeling about it results from it.

If Reckful would feel depressed because of the thought "everything has no purpose" or I because of thought XYZ, then bringing that thought to mind would result in feeling depressed, no matter how we currently feel, but it's not. The easiest way to demonstrate that to somebody would be to give them bipolar disorder and make them do the experiments I mentioned.

But It also applies to people without mental illness, in fact, the line between mental illness and not mental illness is arbitrary (I'm absolutely not saying that depression isn't real or smth, just that mood fluctuates in cycles, in normal people too, just to a much much lesser degree) "normal" people also have something like bipolar just only a tiny micro version of it, and most probably don't even notice that their mood cyclicly change.

It's really surprising to me that even many therapists and psychiatrists believe that thoughts create mood. When actually it's a reverse causality - mood have a tendency to cause certain thoughts. I don't know how common that realization is, I mean I don't think I would've ever discovered that if not for mental illness. I understand how it can be hard to realize it requires a certain mindfulness and doing experiments on yourself actually trying to make your mood bad when having a good mood (which is a weird thing to do lol) and vice versa

[FourCrossedWands]

One of the best posts on this forum and there are no replies... So, here is mine...

A physical state can also create bad thoughts/depression. You can easily see it on kids. When they are hungry or tired, they will become angry so easily.

You can also have a very good day, then some little detail changes and suddenly, you become depressed.

For example, you have a great mood and find out that your favorite shirt you are just wearing has a hole in it. You now start having bad thoughts that are completely unrelated to the shirt or the activity you are doing. You start thinking how life is unfair and how everything is fucked up.

I am sure that this type of thinking switch happens to everyone sometimes.

I would even say that every human being is mentally ill to some degree.

I have always been saying that humans are just animals with a mental illness.

[Whitney Edwards]

Yea I figured a long time ago it was about mental states. Switching your mental state for a while puts a whole new perspective on the whole situation. Paradigm shift. 

[Princess Arabia]

My comments lately have been about thoughts. This is what's running the show. Not so much about what is happening but the thoughts about what's happened. I totally get this and whenever I tell people stuff like this they totally dismiss it as some airy fairy thing. Ever since I've come to this realization, I've been observing how thoughts are destroying people's lives and states of being.  It's a delicate subject here because speaking about mental illness is a delicate thing for some and one doesn't want to come off as insensitive. 

Half of the time when people have issues, It's thought related and believing in those thoughts that aren't even theirs. They're just thoughts.

We're all mentally ill anyway with some neurosis; it's just for some, it's more noticeable. Separation breeds neurosis. I'm here and you're there breeds pain and suffering. It's automatic. It's just appearing that way, though and is not really the case, only seems to be.

 

Edited May 17, 2024 by Princess Arabia

[theleelajoker]

 

Just watched this. In a nutshell - your emotions are "just a best guess" of your brain about what is, applying meaning to certain circumstances.  Similar to how Anil Seth talks about our senses and how our brain then creates reality and meaning. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lyu7v7nWzfo

Personally, I can agree that emotions and mental states seemed very arbitrary for me. However, more and more I believe that I just did not succeed (yet) in sufficiently understanding the subconscious programming that I carry with me.

For me, there is not "one answer" about what and how we feel / experience. Thoughts, emotions, past experiences, physical states (hunger, being thirsty) and physical activities (movement, breath, body posture) as well as nutrition and environment (who and what is around us?) are all connected, creating a complex system that culminates in our experiences (= how we feel right now).

That's why I believe that any method to change ourselves must be a holistic system as well. Focusing on one thing such as thoughts or emotions are important, but just one step.

[Rayster]

Wow TS, it's sad what happened to Reckful. Suicide impacts someone's life esp at a young age, it isn't easy.