Managing Your Emotions

Emotion [ih-moh-shun]- an affective state of consciousness in which joy, sorrow, fear, hate, or the like, is experienced, as distinguished from the cognitive or volitional states of consciousness.

Over the years, there have been many positions taken regarding feelings and emotions. Most recently, Kanye, in his imminent confusion, tweeted that “feelings are the only facts”. Concordantly, many a “think” have come along and posited things like “emotions are the truth of the moment” and in the realm of competition many theories revolve around the athlete or individual harnessing his or her emotions for the sake of comparative advantage.

As far as pop culture, Kanye’s tweet is very indicative of the confused world that exists on the mainstream level. I am not attempting to diminish his opinion, he is entitled to it, but I simply do not believe that emotions are anything remotely close to factual. They are instinctive and preconscious, therefore existing at levels that are not at our conscious control. Moreover, unless one is exceptional in the realm of spiritual sensitivity, emotions are primarily based on shortsighted and highly subjective datum, they are intensely biased. Ergo, the truth is rarely extricated from the tumult that is someone’s emotional faculty. How you feel is rarely little more than an interpretation, a perspective that has arisen out of personal introspection. Let me make this clear, however, that emotions are incredibly important when making decisions, they are our private divining rods that can often point in the direction of truth. However, they themselves, especially during moments of dense emotional activity, are rarely accurate.

A few posts ago in Eyes of Strangers and When Love Lasts: Principle of Objective Purpose, I went in depth about my beliefs in the importance of objectivity. I defined objectivity in two ways, looking at situation with a sober, unengaged mind, which is virtually impossible and not necessarily healthy and therefore offered an alternative method which is looking at a situation from as many perspectives as possible. Within the Brownian (my last name, very pretentious I know, but it makes things a bit simpler) school of thought, there are 5 parts that comprise the human condition: 1) Spirit 2) Mind 3) Body 4) Soul 5) Heart. Each of these components serve a particular purpose, offer pros and cons, and must be balanced against the other 4. When taking about emotions, clearly we are taking about the heart.

The heart is passionate, therefore it is volatile. Its power lies in the sheer force it applies to the individual. In terms of brute force, I would wager that the heart is the most effective, it can render a grown man helpless and cause a mother to literally move vehicles to save her child. The heart is not a faculty which cares much about logic or rational, sober thought; it is simply a vehicle of the instant. Thus when it swings and locks into a belief system, the response it evokes causes the individual to literally change his or her perception, hence the erroneous belief that it is the truth of the moment. The heart feels, passionately might I add, and therefore the average man or woman will be swept away in its powerful current. Furthermore, the heart is a complex system that is affected by all manners stimuli. Culture, geographical location, natural personality, upbringing, personal interests, music, and so forth are all factors which affect how often a person dips into their emotions and how precise those forays are.

Making decisions based on the emotions provide a few positives. Most obvious, an emotional choice is a powerful one, there is very little sway because of its ability to block any dissenting evidence. Also, the emotional choice usually pulls from such wellsprings as love or compassion, insecurity or fear, therefore, the choice is generally in line with the nature of the human being. Emotional choices are genuine, authentic and therefore provide a satisfaction that encompasses the whole being. The problem, however, is sometimes the emotional triggers that cause us to act one way or the other will create flawed decisional actions that make us look foolhardy or unstable. Moreover, when emotions become blindingly hot, they may in fact cuz us to act in opposition to our desired character, this is especially important of those in transitional areas. As teenagers become adults, they may be trying to slough away the old juvenile habits that are authentic representations of themselves, yet are not aligned with the maturity they are trying to gain a foothold on.

Thus, emotional management becomes paramount when discussion matriculation or any sort of upward mobility. No one has time to deal with the emotionally charged person, especially since, as aforementioned, emotions operate on limited information and cause incorrect conclusions to be jumped on far too often than is acceptable. Employers, managers, supervisors and the like need people who are thinking clearly so that objectives can be met. Lovers, family members, and close friends need a little emotion, but not too much so that the individuals choices don’t wreak havoc on the delicate stasis necessary in all intimate relationships.

Unchecked emotional choices are exceptionally dangerous when discussing strategy and tactics, because only the soberest of minds can see things for what they really are. As a consultant who has swore an oath to the importance of strategy, I absolutely cannot condone overt displays of emotion in choices unless strategically important, for instance if a manager needs to inspire morale, he may just have to get angry. However, that is more of a display than a cold, hard choice.

What I recommend to the person looking for success on any level, is to practice objective thought modeling. Colloquially referred to as “above & below” by my partner and myself, it is creating a matrix which encompasses many perspectives, emotional responses, and reward-consequence assessments, then finding the acceptable trend line within. This requires immense discipline and patience, but I guarantee that it will optimize decisional results.

Emotions are the fuel which charge a person’s passion, therefore just like fuel, it must be monitored closely and calibrated for particular circumstances. Performance grade gasoline, with octane ratings above 91, serve a purpose different than standard 87. So instead of always being the high octane, frivolous individual, wrought with inefficiency, one should expose themselves to more rational pursuits.

In conclusion, although I am an avid believe that this is a system that can work for everybody, I am aware that is not acceptable to everybody. The emotions are far too strong, appear far too real (although they are epitome of unreality) and far too important for most people to let go. They are the easiest available heuristic and as stated the easiest way to ascertain how a person truly, feels about something. Therefore, they are heavily relied upon, damn near mandatory necessities for the bulk of people. As leaders, it is important to know how to deal with these people, you cannot try and level with them using clear cut rationale, but instead you must appeal to the very same emotions they are prone to using. You must employ a sober mind because as someone who makes the heavy decisions and probably under a heap of stress, emotions will cause you to deteriorate and miss opportunities during your pointed duress. Leave the instability to your employees and make a practice of harnessing your emotions through strategic thought. By doing so you keep the forcefulness of an emotional response, with the accuracy and effectiveness of a rational one.

bryce

Age is Just a Number, Human Nature is Timeless

Over the last 3 years I have spoken quite critically of my fellow twentysomethings. This is actually a quite common phenomena, primarily because it is difficult to see clearly when you are inside of a social bracket. Discernment is really reserved for those who can obtain strategically elevated vantage points, thus making much better informed observations. When you’re talking about a rather abstract concept like intragenerational positions this becomes tricky.

Over the last year, I have drifted away from haranguing those in my age bracket, especially in relation to our predecessors. It is commonplace for people to say “man I wish I was born in the ’70s because the music was better and the people were more real” or whatever. This is an exceptionally fallacious argument for a myriad of reasons, the most salient being the relationship between humans, sociology, and chronology. As time goes along, perceptions begin to change and normalcy begins to be reconfigured, often against the will of the preceding group. So what occurs is a strange phenomena of ignorance via retrospection. We begin to venerate those that came before us as we deal with the unwanted changes that are precipitating in our current realities. After all the preceding decades are our developmental origins, whether or not we chose to completely stick with them.

Let me give a brief example, running with the ’70s. Many of us grew up listening to the music of our parents, The Beatles, Sly and the Family Stones, Earth, Wind, and Fire, and so on. Moreover, most of us grew up listening to this iconic music while hearing the stories told to us about the generation. We cross reference this against the material we can directly interface with, the TV shows, the literature published, and so on. We then compare that to what is occurring in our world currently. The differences are stark. We begin looking back at “simpler” times, longing for the days when life was more innocent.

However, as we all know, life was anything but innocent and music was still shunned by many listeners. There was a greater racial divide, further altering the perception of “good music”. Although mainstream media may not have outrightly broadcast, the sexual and narcotic revolutions sweeping the country, their undercurrent was inescapable. There is really little difference in the nature of people between now and then, only superficial alterations made by popular culture.

With all of that stated, I want to comment on an earmark that has become a serious characteristic of 21st century people. We are all completely driven by instant gratification. That which comes easy and fast is that which we prefer. Let me toss in a caveat, instant gratification is not new; it is a concept that has been gaining steam for thousands of years. Progress — industrial, academic, mental — in based almost exclusively on maximizing efficiency. It is about doing things faster, producing more units, and cutting out unnecessary components. However, with the advent of various digital technologies we have taken instant gratification to almost every part of the human condition. Social networks, PDF’s, news sites, pornography, you name it and it has been calibrated to produce the fastest access to pleasure.

So what is to be said? What are the implications on society? Well for us twentysomethings, it has caused us to be exceptionally aware, cautious, entitled, and confident. We are proverbial know-it-alls. However, for those older than us, it has caused a serious rift in the delicate fabric of socialization. Divorces are through the roof. Less communication in person and more via the internet and so on.

But why? Because humankind is a creature of balance, too much of something causes its polar opposite. Therefore, too much exposure to humanity causes one to become inhumane. Mind fuck right? But think about it, as technology has progressed and cultures have been brought together, especially in big cities, paranoia, antisociality, and frustration has gone up. This is why urban jungles, even those in affluent neighborhoods, have fallen prey to over-socialization or an over exposure to other humans.

Instant gratification, a common goal for almost every human on the planet, the very impetus for every breakthrough innovation for the last 200 years, has dehumanized people by overly humanizing them. Instant gratification causes one to receive too many stimuli; we are each bombarded daily by information. Cultural capital is traded immensely, information is literally hurled at you from the moment you open your eyes.

So as you look at society and the g-force of the upswing of the tech era, don’t sit around and say “see thats kid kids nowadays __________”. Instead look at how these things are affecting the very nature of humanity, every soul. Time has a way of solidifying beliefs, so of course the older generations are less susceptible, but even they have seen marked changes in how they interact with one another. The issues at hand are not intergenerational, they are those that speak to very core of human nature. Yes because of evolved circumstances, each generation will have a set of characteristics that differentiate it from others, but I personally don’t believe that is such a big deal.

bryce

Demystifying Conventional Wisdom: Introduction

No one knows anything for certain.

This has become the obsessive impetus of my fledgling business and philosophical mind. There is no certainty in this world whatsoever, besides the minutiae in one’s life, but even then those are arguably in a state of flux. What this creates then, is a world in which the prevailing theories are simply that, theories. They are not concrete concepts as we have all been lead to believe, not by a long shot. Scientists, or those familiar with the field, are perfectly aware of this reality and change their verbiage to accomodate for the uncertainty. Nothing is “proven” in science, the truth is the scientific method “proves” nothing. Instead the goal is inverted, they set out to disprove the theories they generate.

How is this relevant to everyday life? Well take a look at your social networking feed, for this will provide all the empirical data for the parallel I am positing. As you scroll down your timeline what you will see are dozens and dozens of opinions that are formulated in such a way that they are posted as bulletproof positions. The person on the other side of that screen is a fervent believer in what they have posted. However, we are all aware that these are merely opinions and have no real problem disregarding and simply scrolling down to the next post or leaving the site altogether. Now, expanding the lens several orders of magnitude and look at society at large. What is wildly exchanged as “correct” information, is in fact nothing more than the opinion of someone or something (like an organization) that society deemed correct. There truthfully is no “correctness” inherently, besides the fact that it worked for a limited time.

What I’m trying to capture is so incorporeal that I’m having a hard time putting it in words tonight, but the essential statement I’m making is that anything is right and nothing is right. There is no such thing as right or “correct” outside of an accepted system of belief. Let me be clear, I am not talking morals or ethics right now, I do believe in right and wrong conduct in terms of treating other people and taking care of your body. No, what I’m making references to are the paradigms, the pedagogies, the very ways of thinking that have permeated through society. They are such an integral part of existence that many of them don’t appear as culprits themselves, so this post will seem like I’m chasing ghosts, but I pray that you bear with me.

Why are we taught certain things in schools? Why do we have bipartisan politics? Why are churches run the way that they are? Who runs the world? What is the appropriate rhetoric for winning a debate? How do you introduce a new product to the market with measurable success? How are you supposed to raise your child? Should you wait until marriage for sex? Is marriage even necessary? Is sex sacred? Why do we worship celebrities? What is the best vehicle? Does race exist? Do angels and demons exist? Is global warming real? Is there such thing as “reverse racism”? Does the Bible permit slavery? Are Islam, Christianity, and Judaism all essentially the same? Does Eastern thought prove to be a viable alternative for those tired of Western religion? Are politics fair? Is democracy the best way? Do we have a good representation of democracy?

Hopefully you see where I’m going. These questions and literally thousands more embody the paradigms of opinion that will be offered up on any given day. Go to your favorite news site, scroll down to the comments and look at the myriad of opinions on anything. You can see the informed duke it out with the ill-informed. The conservate fight with the liberal. The ruthless capitalist bicker with the proponent for economic equality. The democrat versus the republican. The Christian versus the atheist. The Deist versus the Theist. And so on…

So who is right? I mean we have all the materials necessary to come up with coherent, concrete beliefs right?

I say no. The fact of the matter is that mankind MUST give up something in order to receive something. As a species that enjoys free will we HAD to give up something, that something ultimately whittles down to unity. I don’t mean unity in terms of we stand together in physical form, that is merely the result of a much earlier, much broader problem. We have no unity in interpretation. For as long as I can see things my way and you yours, then there will always be a divide.

This is neither good nor bad, that isn’t the point I’m trying to get across. If I had a thesis for this post it would be this:

There is no such things as the right way or the wrong way to do something. In a world in which the variables are innumerable and the margin for error fluctuates, there is always another way of doing, another way of thinking, another way of achieving, another way of failing. Do not ever let anyone come along and tell you that what you’re doing is wrong, instead guidance, correction, consulting and the information offered should always be immersed in the reality that another way has been discovered that might provide desired results. Furthermore, and even more disparaging to conventional thought, expert opinion is as fleeting and silly as the fool’s. Many expert economists are guessing as to what the economy will do, your professors are merely relaying what history has shown, but no one is truly clairvoyant unless somehow imbued by the gnosis of The Almighty Lord Himself.

What this means for you, reader, is that the world is a stage. It is a stage that has no boundaries, no parameters (outside of the laws of the land and even thoughts are exceptionally malleable). But the only true success comes from the individual that overwhelms perception, not all at once, but over the course of a lifetime. You CANNOT look to one particular instance as a means of derivating knowledge or applying wisdom or saying you’re right, you must be patient.

You must acknowledge that knowledge is only as real as the dimension it exists in, which as we have all come to realize, is UNreal. So what works right now may not work tomorrow and what works tomorrow might not work today. Don’t spend your time trying to embody the rules of the system of thought imposed by society, merely learn the rules then obliterate them.

Be blessed.

Bryce

The Eyes of Strangers

I finished 2012 in a very good place: frustrated and not so patiently awaiting the future.

Frustration tends to be something that most people avoid, when in fact it is probably the most fecund cognitive soil one can be standing on. Frustration can stem from a variety of sources: confusion, impatience, disappointment and so on… All of those are oppositional regions and as many understand opposition gives way to opportunity.

These last few weeks have got me thinking about decisional matrices and how one can make choices that consistently provide marks in the “win” column, as opposed to letting our fates be precariously placed in the hands of chance or luck. There is of course the reality that those that seems lucky are really those that place themselves constantly around or within or adjacent to opportunity. However, there is another heuristic that one can begin to employ and the concept is rather simple.

The Eyes of Strangers.

Within VB ICON’s methodology we stress the need for people to remain objective as possible. Objectivity does not get bogged down, distracted, or encumbered by setback. Objectivity minimizes drama and keeps one’s eye on the conceptual prize, keeping a clear and concise tally on minor and major achievements. Objectivity understand that there is no “destination” because you are always there, right now is the only thing you have full control over.

The newest contribution to this paradigm is an actual 3 dimensional representation of what we call a “decisional matrix”, which is a fancy name for the process one goes through when they make a choice. Most people employ a very, very limited decisional matrix, one defined by what they’ve experienced, what they feel, and what they think they want something to look like. This is fine if you want to live a limited life of mediocrity, however, if you’re anything like me and you want to broaden your perceptive horizons then there are many another components one can add to their cognizance that instantly boost their effectiveness. I call it “Above and Below/Adjacent/Orbital” or “Above and Below” for short.

When you are on the verge of making a choice you should take a moment to analyze the various vantage points surrounding that instant. The “above” vantage point is what YOU know, feel, and generally think. The “below” vantage point is what an opposing party would feel or say. The “adjacent” vantage points are opinions and outlook of family, friends, or other close individuals. The “orbital” vantage points are the most dynamic, in that they capture the essence of The Eyes of Strangers. From these outer orbits, the individual should look at their situation or choice the way someone who knows absolutely nothing about them would look at it. This exercise is maximized when the individual can look at someone else’s decisions and see how dynamic objectivity can really be. This is an exercise which challenges the nasty habit we all have of “not being able to take our own advice”, which is a gripe that one will hear over and over and over again dealing with our various social circles. When a person is in the throes of a situation, their heart, their emotions, their feelings, their prejudices, the hidden parts of their subconscious and even preconscious come rushing to the fore, overthrowing any semblance of rational thought, thus leading them full speed into an inefficient decision.

This is the nature of most of our problems. We subject ourselves to the fluctuations of the Self while diminishing the rejuvenating components of rational thought, spiritual insight, and other forms of wisdom we as humans can tap. The purpose of The Eyes of Strangers is to get one back on track, back to the cognitive paths which see situations from the big picture, or at the very least a bigger picture than your frustration has relegated you to. For the truly Esoteric, The Eyes of Strangers is looking at your own life as the Almighty looks at us, Pure Objectivity, Pure Clarity, Pure Ration, although paradoxically juxtaposed within an irrational concept as a Transcendent God.

The beauty of life, to me, exists within these absurd paradoxes. I would consider myself a quasi-Absurdist.

I digress.

By using constructs such as The Principle of Objective Purpose and The Eyes of Strangers and its subsequent “Above and Below” components, an individual imbues him- or herself with the power to see lightyears beyond the limits of their personal Condition. You make yourself privy to information generally reserved for the intellectual and social elite. Looking outside of yourself is the primary and most effective way to reduce selfishness, pride, ego, malevolence, bitterness, the whole menu of negative human expressions.

Become the best version of yourself.

bryce