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Kindle Notes & Highlights
by
Ryan A. Bush
Read between
October 7 - November 13, 2023
Anger and Hatred Anger arises when one perceives that his strategic goals have been impeded through the fault of another. It is a social emotion which likely evolved as a mechanism to deter people from violating various boundaries, such as harming, shaming, or stealing from others.17 Initially, this deterrence would seem to be a useful function even today. But most of the time, our anger is directed toward situations or inanimate objects. It is only after we remind ourselves that there is no conscious target of blame that our anger subsides, and it becomes clear that our rage and hatred has
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See Spinoza's Analysis of Emotion for more on this
Even in circumstances in which anger is directed toward other people, it is rarely the most effective strategy for dealing with them. The Tao Te Ching reminds us that “the best fighter is never angry,” and if even fighters are more effective without anger, it is hard to conceive of cases in which it benefits us. As one understands the true causes and motives of his enemy’s actions, assigning blame for anything becomes less and less reasonable. Great people develop superior strategies for dealing with obstacles, threats, and aggression.18 A person who can stand her ground while responding to
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In the lowest recess of the heart let it be hidden away, and let it not drive, but be driven. Moreover, let us change all its symptoms into the opposite: let the expression on our faces be relaxed, our voices gentler, our steps more measured; little by little outer features mold inner ones. - Seneca, On Anger
He suggests that by controlling our expressions of anger, we can keep it contained, prevent it from doing any damage, and train our inner feelings of anger to mirror our outer expressions of calmness.20 If we can program algorithms like these to be triggered automatically by feelings of anger, we can gradually master the emotion. Learn to view every frustration you encounter as a test of mental strength, and you will get better and better at maintaining your patience, levity, and control.
Embarrassment and Shame Shame is a social emotion which has to do with our social status and and observance of norms. We feel shame when we embarrass ourselves, offend other people, or feel that someone else disapproves of us. It serves the purpose of discouraging us from risking our social status or mate prospects, but it generally does more harm than good.21 No matter how prepared we are, we cannot help being afraid of embarrassment when public speaking. No matter how inaccurate or irrelevant to our values, an insult from another person stings for days after we receive it.
The opinions and comments of others often have more to do with their own insecurities than any meaningful statement about us.22 In the rare case that we learn from the affronts of others, we simply need to work on changing our own behaviors, and these changes need not be accompanied by pain.
Envy and Schadenfreude Envy is the feeling which results from comparing oneself to another and finding that they have something we want or feel we deserve. We experience envy to drive us to fight for more wealth, higher status, and more sexual partners.23 But when we envy someone, we deprive ourselves of the satisfaction of appreciating what we have and keep ourselves on the vicious treadmill of gain which will never deliver satisfaction.
Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not; remember that what you now have was once among the things you only hoped for. - Epicurus, Principal Doctrines
Envy and comparison can prevent satisfaction from ever increasing, regardless of how high a person’s or community’s living standard rises.24 In order to fight it, we have to embed what is important to us into our software, and what is important should never be relative to those around us.25 Don’t be the best. Be the only. - Kevin Kelly
The best counter for envy is to shift your perspective, reminding yourself that you are competing only with yourself.27 If you measure yourself by your unique combination of qualities and strengths instead of a one-dimensional metric, you will rarely come across people worth envying.
Schadenfreude is the German word for delight in the misfortune of others. Many people relish the losses of other people and feel averse to their gains - sometimes even those they care about.28 A good friend, and an adaptive individual, should genuinely delight in the successes of his friends. When your own values are the benchmark of your well-being, the only person you should be envious of is one which is more you than you are. And in this event, you will know what needs to be done.
Fear, Worry, and Anxiety Fear can serve as a helpful reaction to acute threats, but because we live in a world in which many of our decisions are made for future goals, many of us experience anxiety, a prolonged and future-oriented version of fear. Anxiety often involves rumination over the far future, but can range from worry about meeting deadlines to the intense fear of hair (Chaetophobia). Anxiety exists as a kind of alarm to let us know to avoid threats to our genes, but more often than not, it ends up resulting in useless false positives.29
In a conversation with Robert Wright, evolutionary psychiatrist Randolph Nesse describes a reason for this. He says that our threat detection system, like many other bodily responses, is shaped by natural selection to be hypersensitive. It errs on the side of overreaction to ensure that it goes off when it needs to. He adds, This is why we put up with smoke detectors. They don’t warn us about a fire but once in a lifetime, but they warn us about burnt toast every week. - Randolph Nesse
Nothing can harm you as much as your own thoughts unguarded. - Siddhārtha Gautama, Anguttara Nikaya
If you can program your software to remember the futility of worry as soon as it arises, you can gradually eliminate it from your emotional vocabulary. This change will free up your mental bandwidth to focus on the best course of action instead of being paralyzed by panic.
Grief and Sadness Sadness and grief are experienced when we perceive we have lost something important to us, whether that is our chances at achieving a goal, a cherished possession, or a close relationship. Though some types of sadness can help us learn to avoid bad outcomes or connect with others, much of the grief of loss we experience remains unexplained. We don’t fully understand why we suffer so deeply when a loved one passes away, and some believe it to be an unfortunate byproduct of other emotional mechanisms.
Whatever the cause, grief is one of the most acute and common forms of suffering. Dr. Nesse says that though he expected people who experience little grief after loss to be deeply impaired in other ways, he was surprised to find that these people seem to be just as healthy in their lives and social relationships as those who grieve deeply.34
Buddhism encourages people to develop a different kind of relationship with their gains, possessions, and even their loved ones.35 When we fully understand that all things must end, we can learn to appreciate the finite amount of time we have with others and celebrate the end rather than repeatedly mourning the tragedy of impermanence.
Guilt and Remorse We often experience guilt or remorse when we act in a way that violates our own values.36 I would advise you not to eliminate this impulse completely, as it can serve a useful function by promoting your values. But we need to calibrate our conscience to activate at the right times and not the wrong ones. Say you find yourself in a difficult situation and have to make a decision. In retrospect, you realize you made the wrong one. You experience a wave of guilt and regret that lingers for months, or even years. Though you may believe this feeling is justified, I would argue
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One of the counter-algorithms offered by Nate Soares in his book, Replacing Guilt, has to do with the way we talk to ourselves about our obligations: Just stop doing things because you ‘should.’ As in, never let a ‘should’ feel like a reason to do something… When you're deliberating, your only responsibility is to figure out which action seems best given the available time and information. - Nate Soares, Replacing Guilt
If you can't identify what you could do better, there is no use in punishing yourself for it. And as long as you make the best decisions you can at any given time, you cannot reasonably blame yourself for the outcome.37 Your conscience is a tool. You want to train your remorse to activate when you knowingly act against your own values or interests.
Jealousy is contrasted with envy through its focus on something one already has but fears losing, particularly a romantic partner. It exists as a clear mechanism for preventing the loss of one’s mate.38 But like so many other negative emotions, it is a crude instrument for bringing about this outcome. Your protectiveness may keep your partner around long enough to pass on your genes, but if it is a healthy, long-term relationship you long for, you will only do damage by trying to shelter your partner from other people.
There are numerous ways to weaken jealousy’s hold on you. You can lower its sensitivity by restructuring your beliefs about human psychology, reminding yourself that a conversation with another person does not indicate plans to leave one’s current partner for them.40 You can remind yourself that your significant other is human, will be attracted to other people besides you, and that this is perfectly fine.
And you can internalize the idea that if your partner decides to part with you, it likely was not the right relationship to be in.42 The most helpful algorithm I have come across for eliminating jealousy is a refusal to identify as another person’s possessor, found in this quote attributed to Osho: If you love a flower, don’t pick it up. Because if you pick it up it dies and it ceases to be what you love. So if you love a flower, let it be. Love is not about possession. Love is about appreciation.
Take a radical approach of appreciating every moment you get to spend with other people, but never considering them yours. If you love someone, you will want to promote their flourishing as an individual, not as a possession
See Polysecure
Love, Compassion, and Empathy In addition to our competitive and aggressive tendencies, we were endowed with a number of pro-social and altruistic tendencies and emotions. We are made to care deeply about our loved ones, to feel the pain of others, and to try to help those who belong to our tribe.44 Most people consider compassion and emotional empathy to be universally positive traits. But these emotions have a dark side too. The value of emotional empathy has been called into question by Paul Bloom in his book, Against Empathy: The Case for Rational Compassion
Bloom argues that empathy is quite often counterproductive for our individualistic good, causing us unnecessary pain that does not sustainably compel us to solve problems. Some people are so compassionate that they regularly suffer pointlessly on behalf of others.
See the perils of loving your job too much
Though most people in the Western world are not fazed by the notion of universal love, the original teachers who extolled it were considered radical at the time, and universal compassion is actually a counterintuitive and powerful tool. Love your enemies! Do good to them. Lend to them without expecting to be repaid. - Jesus Christ, Luke 6:35 NLT
There is no more reliable proof of greatness than to be in a state where nothing can happen to make you disturbed. - Seneca, On Anger
Resilience has become a pop-psychological buzzword, and for good reason. Learning to quickly recover from inevitable setbacks is far more practical than attempting to avoid them all. Highly resilient people are better at coping with stress, have fewer depressive symptoms, live longer, and have greater physical health.53 54 But why don’t we aim higher? If emotional resilience is getting back up after getting knocked down, emotional robustness is not getting knocked down in the first place
A robust mind is one with a powerful immune system - one which can bear more without bending. And we fortify our minds, not by circumventing threats, but by preparing for them. We improve ourselves by exposing ourselves to difficulties so our minds learn to deal with them effectively.
Believing an emotion to be useful is one thing. But if you are unable to control the emotion, you are not using it. It is using you. If you are unable to keep from getting angry, you have a major weakness, no matter how hard you punched that wall. If you are unable to keep from getting jealous constantly, your partner’s mind is not necessarily a problem, but yours is.
The central idea we’ve covered in the last three chapters, that you can simply reprogram a negative emotional response with which you may struggle, may seem overly simplistic. But over the years, I have repeatedly proven to myself that by viewing emotional algorithms as the root of my problems, these reactions can be eliminated entirely. Each unwanted emotional response poses a unique challenge for creative problem solving. Some are more challenging than others. But I cannot emphasize enough that resignation to negative emotions is the greatest obstacle to a tranquil mind
Undesirable emotions are bugs in your software. Each emotional category which causes you to feel or act against your values reveals a vulnerability in your psychological code. Culture is keen to remind people that it is okay to feel hurt and upset. This may be important for people to understand, but it’s a bit like telling a programmer it is okay to have errors in his code. Sure, it’s okay. Taking it personally will only create more problems. But now it’s time to debug it
we aim to optimize our emotions, we must attempt to cultivate the ancient ideal of equanimity. Equanimity is a state of undisturbed tranquility and psychological stability, with equivalent concepts in nearly every practical philosophy and religion - apatheia in Greek Stoicism, ataraxia in Epicureanism, and upekkha in Buddhism.56 Someone with this state of mind was someone whose balance of mind could not be shaken, even in the face of great adversity. Equanimity is the pinnacle of psychological robustness and control.
It is evenness of mind, unshakeable freedom of mind, a state of inner equipoise that cannot be upset by gain and loss, honor and dishonor, praise and blame, pleasure and pain. - Bhikkhu Bodhi, Toward a Threshold of Understanding
Equanimity is about feeling the way you feel about your five-years-ago-problems right now, about your current problems. Meaning they either aren't problems, are problems that will sort themselves out, or are problems that are good to have. And this state is attained through the gradual process of identifying the emotional reactions that hold you back, using the restructuring and modulation tactics to correct them, and reprogramming each one until you are left with nearly total stability, regardless of your circumstances.
Just as rationality and introspection came together as the building blocks for cognitive self-mastery, cognitive restructuring and desire modulation form the building blocks for emotional self-mastery.
Do not allow your strength in one area to justify your weakness in another.
The psychitect takes the Aristotelian approach of trying to experience the right emotions, whether positive or negative, not simply the most positive or peaceful ones, which modern research suggests is a better indicator of deep well-being.
Our emotions should only be considered useful to us insofar as they serve our personal goals, and there are certain emotions which are almost always harmful to us.
Seneca suggested that feelings of anger can be countered by delaying our responses, maintaining controlled outer expressions, and training our inner feelings of anger to mirror our outer expressions of calmness.
Shame is also rarely beneficial, as it exists to preserve our social status and not our values.
Yogi Bhajan offered a powerful counter-algorithm to shame, involving viewing other people’s judgments of us as products of their own issues and insecurities rather than a reflection of us.
