Anger and Sadness; Obsession and Passivity

[reeay]

Spaced, yeah, your description reminds me of how anger and sadness are categorized: Anger can be described as 'externalization'. Sadness is called 'internalization' bc it's kind of withdrawing inside rather than expressing outwardly like anger.

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There are many functionalities (ways to use) anger or sadness, and that's context specific - so the meaning & nature of anger or sadness or any emotion depends on the specific situation.

Emotions are signposts of a catalyst yet to be processed - so what's to be processed? When catalyst occurs you might experience varying (sometimes contradictory) emotions at the same time but the brain can attend to it only one at a time. It isn't emotions per say that is important but what is called 'emotional schemes' - organized sets of information about action tendencies, our beliefs - so anything we learned/experienced before is organized into these neat packages that help us to tune into what we need to attend to. It's kind of like a template that tells us how to interpret catalyst based on emotional experiences. We can figure out what these emotional schemes are about by looking at the different levels of emotions (primary, secondary, and instrumental) + loads of other stuff like how we avoid certain emotional experiences (we call it 'splitting').

Primary emotion is one's deep feelings towards catalyst. This is usually hidden because we notice how we react to emotions rather than the core emotional experience at once (and this might be more than one emotion being experienced).

Secondary emotion is the reaction to the primary emotion. For example, you are hurt or sad (primary) so you react in anger, fear, shame, etc.,. This is probably the most accessible experience.

Instrumental emotion is the way we express our emotions bc it's the most 'convenient' or do-able or socially accepted way. I can react to painful situations via anger but since anger is not acceptable way to express myself I will cry and appear sad (ooooh honesty). Maybe I'm very angry in the core, but being angry somehow makes me experience loads of sadness. Then I begin to cry. Many different ways we emotionally respond to situations.

Basic point - it really depends how emotions like anger and sadness and fear and whatnot means in a specific situation, and what it has meant in past experiences.