Peter was miserable and didn’t know why. He decided it was his wife’s, Elizabeth’s, fault. After all, she was his wife; she was supposed to love him, and since he was miserable, she must have let him down in some way.
He didn’t know what way, exactly. But it must have been her. So the memory of an argument last night came back to him. He wanted to take away Jimmy’s cellphone because his grades were below par. That would have been okay with Elizabeth except that he was so mad that he was screaming at Jimmy and Jim was crying. She felt the screaming was enough misery and objected to the phone going, too. So she said so.
That was an awful thing to do to him, Peter decided, to embarrass him in front of their child by contradicting him. Aren’t parents supposed to be on the same page?
See? He knew it was Elizabeth’s fault all along. So convenient, right? To blame your spouse when all else fails?
Sarah was different. She did not blame her spouse. Instead, she took her misery out on herself. It was all her fault, stupid woman. There. That should work. Blame yourself and feel . . . worse, not better.
What’s the point of that? None, actually.
Since Sarah felt so miserable and blaming herself – though accurate in her eyes – didn’t help, she stopped off at the local pub to forget all that.
Research shows that we cannot make decisions without our emotions. And lest you think that you’re the rational, exception, you’re not. One person was studied who had had brain surgery and the part of his brain that is involved in emotions was removed. He could not decide between two restaurants and he spent well over an hour going back and forth with no end in sight. Emotions are actually necessary to function.
*In his book, Incignito: The Secret Lives of the Brain, David Eagleman relates that the left hemisphere of the brain – the part that governs language acquisition – has to make meaning out of our actions. So, researchers asked subjects to read a paragraph from a book. Half of the subject were given a pencil to hold between their teeth while reading. Note that they all read the same paragraph. Here’s the clincher: People who had the pencil in their mouth thought the material was funnier! Why? – Because the pencil made them smile. Their brain therefore “decided” the information was funnier.
*In another study, in the Annual Review of Psychology, people were studied who suffered injuries to the part of their brain that integrates thinking and emotion. These subjects were found to make riskier financial decisions because they were not getting “emotional signals” that healthy people would get which would feel like a fear of high risks. When researchers talked to these people, they cognitively understood the high risks, but this understanding was not experienced at a feeling level.
*The reviewers point out that this is quite common among people without any brain impairment. For example, although the death rate for auto accidents is higher than it is for plane crashes, people with a fear of flying will choose to drive to their distant destinations.
*And here’s one that’s super applicable to our topic from the same journal: “Anger triggered in one situation automatically elicits a motive to blame individuals in other situations even though the targets of such anger have nothing to do with the source of the anger.”
So let’s review everything we know about the role of emotions in our behavior:
Most of it is unconscious. We don’t know what motivates us but we find ourselves making choices anyway.
We explain, justify, or rationalize these choices because we need to make sense to ourselves – even when the rationalization is quite irrational.
David Hume summarized this in 1738 when he said, “Reason is, and ought only to be, the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them.”
Now, Peter has decided to divorce Elizabeth. She’s such a trouble-maker. And the proof is that they can’t get along.
Sarah has decided to separate from her husband, Adam, because they don’t get along either.
They’re both terrified of looking at themselves. They know they’ll find something awful there. Better to blame their spouses and move on.
They shouldn’t be. Inside, they’re not at all bad. I know. I’ve met hundreds of Sarahs and Peters. I will teach them to love themselves. That’s the road to loving the people around you. You can’t have one without the other.
Book a call with me and find out how to get on top of the mystery of your own feelings – and never again blame anyone for them. https://drdeb.com/book