I encourage everyone to do three basic things, think for yourself, seek what is true and to trust facts not feelings. This has been a theme of my previous posts but I don't think this can be said enough.
Everyone has feelings but not everyone has the curiosity or the discipline to search for facts that may contradict their feelings. Conmen, propagandists and cult leaders thrive in this environment . Manipulating the masses by their feelings has become main stream today.
Feeling emotions to their fullest is what is special about life. I have experienced love beyond imagination and have had my heart broken. I have felt the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat. I have felt absolute fear and the soothing safety of a protector. The ups and downs of emotions is the spice of life.
I believe our need to love and to feel loved is what I think God means when He says we are made in his image. Like the need for food, clothing and shelter the need to love and bond is vital to human survival. All of these require a balance but sometimes we get out of balance.
It has become common today that emotions are valued above facts. We hear things like "my truth" or "my reality" and somehow this becomes a valid argument. It has become acceptable that feelings have become arguments that counter proven facts.
It takes little effort to live in a world of emotion. We take in the world around us and simply feel, no research, investigation or questioning. Combine this with pier pressure and the silencing of those who sight proven facts, we have a society that is drifting from feeling to feeling.
This may explain why there is such a divide in opinions. One side feels and accuses the other side that they don't care because they sight facts. It is true that empathy, fear and sadness requires a response so we hear pleas to "do something"! The other side looks at cause and effect, laws, rights and results. How a person feels about a document doesn't change what it says.
Debate is almost nonexistent today. It is hard to argue with feelings. Feelings can change from moment to moment and person to person so feelings are like jello, they are hard to nail down. Polls are sighted as if they are facts but they only prove a majority of people feel a similar way. On the other hand pure legalistic arguments can sometimes be heartless and cruel, there needs to be a balance.
We should not blindly trust feelings or blindly trusting facts. We all need to learn how to value both.
I will admit I have learned not to trust feelings because I was deceived by my own feelings for many years.
When I was lost in my struggle with alcohol I thought I was a logical thinking person but under the surface I was being controlled by my feelings. I knew for a fact my drinking had become a problem so I would swear off drinking but find myself drunk by the end of the day.
This went on until I thought I was crazy. I found help with the 12 steps and other sober alcoholics. I learned I was subconsciously making emotional decisions based on pure feelings, fear, anger, worry and hate. Being comfortably numb most of the time I was deceived by my emotions.
I had to learn to set my emotions aside and trust basic facts to stay sober. This took some time to learn, so I now fall on the side of questioning every feeling. After practicing this for 32 years it is how I think today.
I'm not a smarter or better person, I just learned to question my emotions as a mode of survival. I still get caught up in a too good to be true sales scheme now and then, follow an emotional argument for a while and believe a politician for a millisecond, but eventually I find myself peaking behind the curtain.
This post won't change the world or heal the divide in society but it might get at few people to think. I have seen this as a major problem all through history. Short term, emotions usually win out over facts, but eventually the facts can no longer be ignored because of the eventual consequences.
The pendulum swings eventually but unfortunately it can sometimes be too late. I trust in the one fact that is constant, God is in control. I can want people and things to go the way I think they should but I can only control my own behavior.
Our society is hurting today, I'm part of the "If it feels good do it " generation so I have no moral high ground to stand on. I do however think there is a quiet movement that none of us can see going on in the background. History has shown us that people only change when things get difficult.
