First Law Of Emotion
we're all aware, from high school or university physics, of newton's laws of motion -- particularly his third law which tends to be summed up as "for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction". i've had this little theory rattling around in my head that i think i'll dub as ac's first law of emotion for the time being. after recent events, i thought it was worth sitting down for a few minutes and trying to document and share.
emotion is the result of a push or pull upon the heart (or soul) which results from its interaction with another being*. unlike in newton's laws, there is sometimes no measurable or identifiable force thought it's presense is incontrovertible. as with the physical world, emotion has states and is subject to resistance, friction, and tensional forces along with a wide variety of "distance forces" such as societal perception and expectations.
gravitation cannot be held responsible for people falling in love
-- albert einstein
lets not forget inertia! emotions, too, have a natural tendency to resist changes to their state. be them highs or lows, we tend to keep doing what we are doing until acted upon by an unbalanced force. this of course is in direct opposition to more popular conceptions where time is viewed as contact force -- "you'll get over it in time".
so what brought this on? i have noticed lately that every time something happens where i experience the emotion of joy or happiness, there has been an equal and opposite reaction. now my mind spins this a couple ways. i've subconsciously cringed as happy feelings arise in anticipation of an oncoming depression. the other side is my justification that when "shit happens", like the system outage i had to deal with last night, i'm left hopeful that the pendulum will be shortly swinging back the other direction. there are clearly other forces at work here, because the swings aren't always to extremes, but those thoughts will have to wait for another day.
*interaction with inanimate objects can also stimulate emotions.
Posted by ac at June 11, 2004 02:09 PM