--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "lurkernomore20002000" <steve.sun...@...> wrote: > > Not sure if this makes any sense, but I find it kind of > incredible when people respond with "softened" emotions, > rather than "hardened" emotions.
Having responded once with tongue firmly in cheek, I'll respond more seriously. I don't think that what you're referring to is "hardened" emotions but "manufactured" emotions. My "take" on the dynamic of FFL in which some respond to minor provocation with a major display of emotion is that they are *indulging* in the emotion because they don't actually feel much emotion most of the time. They don't feel (or at any rate don't write here about feeling) emotion about the quiet and subtle things in life. Stuff like the appreciation of a great sunrise or sunset, the laughter of child- ren, the way your body feels after a good run. Marek is a clear example of someone who *is* capable of doing this. His posts on surfing and his and Edg's posts on the rush of Trikking are often the closest we get to positive emotions on this forum. And I am not exactly the "gold standard" in this regard, either; I sometimes gush about movies I have seen that turn me on, but too often I don't express enought positive emotion, either. But negative emotion? That we've got in spades. Let someone suggest a way of seeing a poster that doesn't jibe with that poster's way of seeing themselves, and the snit hits the fan. It often feels as if they take in the minor provocation and shoot it up like meth and then react emotionally *as if it had been a major provocation*. A joke about someone becoming so angry that they burst into flames as a result of spon- taneous combustion becomes a "death threat." Someone pointing out a racist remark made by a person who once *bragged* about being a racist becomes an issue so emotional that the person threatens real-world retaliation. Someone criticizes (or worse, laughs at) Maha- rishi and others react as if *they* had been criticized, or attacked physically. Point out that Hillary Clinton has a proven track record as more of a creator of conflict rather than a resolver of it, and some turn that into a slur against all women. I'm not actually *complaining* about all this "manufactured emotion." It's what makes FFL entertaining. It's like watching a soap opera. High drama, low consciousness. My suggestion for WHY "manufactured emotion" is more acceptable here on FFL than real emo- tion is that that's the situation in the TMO as well. There are certain situations in which an over-display of emotion are considered "good" and others in which an over-display of emotion are considered "bad." "Good" emotions include bhakti meltdowns when talking about Maharishi, Guru Dev, and God. Another "good" emotion is righteous anger, when someone says something negative about any of that holy trinity, or TM itself. "Bad" emotions involve anything that suggests that you're still (spit) human, and mired in Maya, like...uh... tolerance of opinions that differ from yours, or tolerance of someone perceiving Maharishi, TM, the TMO, or you differently than you'd like them to be perceived. Stick with the "good" emotions, and amplify them out of proportion. That's the FFL Way.
