This has been a long time coming, in part because psychologists have a hard time agreeing on the emotions. Well to no surprise, using the best of the old and the best of the new worked for me again. I combined Plutnik's new ideas on emotions with Aristotle's old ideas on emotions (with some of my own stuff mainly gleaned from Scripture and language study since the Bible uses language) to get to where I arrived today. I was not there yesterday, or the day before that, or the day before that as opposed to where I am in today. Hey, if you keep driving, you usually get somewhere eventually!
Yesterday I put together Plutnik's stuff in a new format, but also noted some emotional gaps in his format. For one thing, Darwin and his crowd die hard, even when they are wrong. This kept Plutnik's model of emotions a little blinded. So reading in Aristotle's Rhetoric today, I looked for his section on emotions (pathos) to see if he could yield insight. Once again, some old Greek writer woke me up with a new thought. What if pathos (emotional appeal) is the greater part of our neurological function, the logical (logos) is lesser part of our neurological function, and the ethical (ethos) - combining the two together - the greatest part of our neurological function?
Here's an example of what I am driving at with this idea. The problem in most appeals today is that they are either all logical or all emotional or at least come too close to those extreme kinds. I am tired of both standing alone without the other. I want some emotional intelligence with some logical intelligence and I am prepared to get mad about it. That's right, emotional about it; but without losing the other half of my nervous system, of course. Why shouldn't a person be upset about something being slighted according to Aristotle? And that is exactly what is happening.
Ironically, today is s special day nationally - it is in the United States the National Day of Prayer. It is also in Wisconsin at least Mental Health Awareness month as declared by Governor Walker. It is also the day that two mental health related deaths occurred in Wisconsin with one in Milwaukee and one elsewhere (among others I am sure). In each case there was a mental health related element that went unresolved.
Milwaukee Police Chief Ed Flynn got angry (at a reasonable level) today about not enough being done for the mentally ill. He said that "none of the investments seem to go to the heart of the problem', when it comes to mental health. He also wanted to be clear that he was not saying this cause any hard feelings in the system, but to simply say that not enough was being done for the mentally ill. I concur. When is the madness going to stop?
Sadly, the very place where both emotional intelligence and logical intelligence should be addressed is also where mad men and mad young people choose to carry out mass killings and their own suicides. We are in dire straits. I do not know how children today can go to school in many communities without fear. I ask: "How do they do it?" Do they just believe it will not happen here - we are fearless? Is that a solution or masking over a deep problem? I think it is the latter.
That is why I think we need to promote EQ of the mind in both private and public schools to really address the problem. Here is how I see each:
I am not certain how easy this "picture" will be to see and read, so let me repeat some of it. First, I should explain that I have used my ARWAT method to set up an ideal order for emotions. Remember I don't think that either emotion or logic is bad and that actually the two together is the ideal. So here is the order of our emotions or feelings (ideally speaking only):
1) Acceptance & Shame (Acceptance is not the same as shameless)
2) Joy & Grief (Joy is not the same as grief-less)
3) Emulation & Envy (Emulation is not envy-less)
4) Confidence & Fear (Confidence is not fearless)
5) Calm & Anger (Calm is not anger-less)
Let me draw out these ideas a bit further:
Acceptance happens when we feel ready (whether due to internal or external reasons)
Shame happens when we feel unready (whether due to internal or external reasons)
Joy happens when there is a will and a way (whether due to internal or external reasons)
Grief happens when even if there is a will there is no way (whether due to internal or external reasons)
Emulation happens when people want to be as one example, "like Mike" (whether due to internal or external reasons)
Envy happens when people want to keep others from being "like Mike" (whether due to internal or external reasons)
Confidence happens when people can do something (whether due to internal or external reasons)
Fear happens when people can't do something (whether due to internal or external reasons)
Calm happens when a person is acknowledged or seen (whether due to internal or external reasons)
Anger happens when a person goes unacknowledged or unseen (whether due to internal or external reasons)
Let me also lay out intellectual intelligence though I have spoken or written about ARWAT before:
This tool combined with the first (see my other previous posts to better understand ARWAT as a method) combine to give us a mind that is ethical. Aristotle spoke of three elements of persuasion: the ethos (ethical), the pathos (emotional), and logos (logical). This latter too is logical. But combined with emotional intelligence, the two together can make a person ethical in terms of knowing good from wrong and greater from lesser.
It is time to resolve the mental health crisis. I say mental because the schools are doing it. They do not grade kids on emotional health. They grade them only on logical health. I have counseled people all the way up to summa cum laude's that were suicidal. They had IQ, but not EQ. I failed in EQ also back in 1983, and I was so devastated by the experience that I resolved and I asked the Good Lord not to ever bring me back there again. Folks, I have not ever been back there again especially in the last 10 years with a raised IQ, but also through years of counseling and good reading to where I have now raised my EQ.
I can't tell you how much I want to make this the month to change things. Why not choose the emotion of joy now over the emotion of grief? Is not putting the solution off simply inviting grief? Do you really think children are safe when adults and children lack emotional intelligence?
If you do I think you are like Magic Johnson who convinced himself that AIDs could never happen to him. If you will use your emotional intelligence and realize how it devastated Magic at least use your logic and remember he was wrong to think it. Let's make this Mental Health Awareness Month into Mental Health Change Month in Wisconsin and in the rest of our nation and the world. Can you give an emotional reason again not to chose joy now over more grief again? Please, I beg you do not procrastinate. It is too potentially costly to our schools. Let's bring back emotion into our teaching, so that the ethic of mass killing followed by high IQ person committing suicide may end. I pray to God on this National Day of Prayer that He will make it so.
Sincerely,
Jon
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