A bit on conceptualizing the intangible and explaining the unseen to sceptics and oth

[Redchic12]

PixieD

Thank YOU for your gracious response. It was much appreciated.

I feel it is so easy to misunderstand what people are trying to express in a few comments. I’ve misunderstood things myself. It’s easy to do.

By the way, I love Confucius.

It’s all good!

[sky]

Originally Posted by TattieHowker

I was just being brief when I said that but if you're going to expand on that.... What is the source of those internal stimuli/events/feelings?

As I have previously said emotions can arise from external and internal stimuli. Emotions come from the brain and the brain is internal, you can change your emotions internally regardless of what is happening externally.
If you look at 'Pain' as one example, it arises internally and can cause disturbances in your emotions, as does illness. The mind is the source of emotions, how you deal with them comes from transforming the mind.......

[TattieHowker]

Originally Posted by sky

E
If you look at 'Pain' as one example, it arises internally and can cause disturbances in your emotions, as does illness. The mind is the source of emotions, how you deal with them comes from transforming the mind.......

There is always an 'object' of emotion. You don't just love, you love your partner and you love spending time in the forums. You don't just hate, you hate the way your neighbour's weeds come through your fence. There is pain and its 'object', your partner leaves you and you feel the emotional pain of that, or you hurt yourself.

That understanding forms the basis of Duality and makes more sense of non-Duality, although non-Duality is a Duality but nobody tells you that.

It's the interaction with those 'objects' and how your unconscious - not your mind, your unconscious - processes that interaction. If you can't believe this is happening to you it's called cognitive dissonance, it happens when you have well-defined ideas or beliefs and you receive contradictory information. Putting it simply, it's the unconscious rejecting the information because it's not compatible with your current paradigm. That includes your beliefs, by the way.

If the information does get through, what happens next is your cognitive behaviour - which is not what you think but how you think about it. There are two 'flavours' of cognitive behaviour - constructive and destructive. Simply, one works for you and one works against you. If your response to Spirituality is that you'll benefit from it then that is constructive cognitive behaviour, if you think you're Spiritual just because you slap a label on your forehead that's destructive cognitive behaviour. As an example, not you personally.

What you have after all that is your emotional response. According to your destructive cognitive behaviour your neighbour hates you so much you feel angry in response and you want to punch his lights out. According to your constructive cognitive behaviour your response is that you don't let it worry you too much because that's the Spiritual thing to do. Both of those create emotions at the time, the emotion is not present otherwise.

What then happens when you feel that emotional response is the brain 'floods' the blood system with chemicals. Since you feel anger at your neighbour adrenaline is pumped through your body, because you feel Spiritual because of your response the brain pumps through the 'happy hormone' - but it's not really a hormone. It's actually Serotonin, Dopamine, Endorphins, and Oxytocin.

The mind - correctly the ego from a Jungian psychology perspective - is the 'end result' of all of that unconscious processing. You can't 'access' your unconscious directly but luckily there's a 'feedback loop' in place, if your mind deems your response to be 'negative' then it gets 'fed back' and your cognitive behaviour changes accordingly. It's not always instant though, some changes only occur after time.

[sky]

Quote TH.
"There is always an 'object' of emotion"

Yes which can be external or internal, as with pain which has no external stimuli and is felt internally and effects emotions.....

[TattieHowker]

Originally Posted by sky

Quote TH.
"There is always an 'object' of emotion"

Yes which can be external or internal, as with pain which has no external stimuli and is felt internally and effects emotions.....

Physical pain is stimulated by something that hurts you physically, when you slip and fall on your backside it hurts because the stimulus of your backside on the floor causes you pain. When someone you love deeply walks out of the door it hurts, because the stimulus of them walking out of the door causes you pain. Pain doesn't come of its own accord, it has a cause and effect.

"No woman, no cry."
Bob Marley

[sky]

Originally Posted by TattieHowker

it has a cause and effect.

Everthing is cause and effect.... including emotions which can be triggered by internal effects.
I presume from what you are saying here is that you haven't experienced internal stimuli that has effected your emotions otherwise you would understand what myself and others are pointing out to you.
Agree to differ and move on .....

[TattieHowker]

Originally Posted by sky

I presume from what you are saying here is that you haven't experienced internal stimuli .

That would be an incorrect presumption, I have been to places that you don't seem to have been to - nor many others on here. Unless you've spent a lot of time with a therapist that went through your unconscious with you and examined it fraction by fraction. I have yet to see a thread on the role of the unconscious in Spirituality, but then one of the main reasons for that is an unconscious process.

Just because a lot of people believe it, it doesn't make it any kind of truth. And so far that's been you and one other.

[Redchic12]

Thank you Sky. A very good comment in #64

I never thought of pain. Yes of course, I guess the pain of cancer would create an internal stimuli resulting in an emotion.

Thank you for pointing that out. A very good example.

[TattieHowker]

Originally Posted by Redchic12

I never thought of pain.

Physical pain is an emotion?

[sky]

Originally Posted by Redchic12

Thank you Sky. A very good comment in #64
I never thought of pain. Yes of course, I guess the pain of cancer would create an internal stimuli resulting in an emotion.
Thank you for pointing that out.

Your welcome
Then we have 'Emotional' pain which is felt internally and originates from non-physical sources. Emotional pain can be caused by internal or external sources, Imo.. Have you personally found emotions can cause physical pain ? Our brains and how they work is still somewhat a mystery...