Emotion only lasts in our bodies for about 90 seconds. After that, the physical reaction dissipates, UNLESS our cognitive brain kicks in and starts connecting our anger with past events.
Interpretation
Emotions are temporary physical responses that can be prolonged by our thoughts and associations.
This quote by Jill Bolte Taylor highlights the transient nature of emotions, suggesting that they typically only last for approximately 90 seconds in our bodies unless we allow our minds to dwell on them by linking them to past experiences. This understanding emphasizes the importance of emotional awareness and the power of our cognitive processes in shaping how we feel over longer periods.
In practice
During a workshop on emotional intelligence, one could use this quote to illustrate how to effectively manage emotions.
Unfortunately, as a society, we do not teach our children that they need to tend carefully the garden of their minds. Without structure, censorship, or discipline, our thoughts run rampant on automatic. Because we have not learned how to more carefully manage what goes on inside our brains, we remain vulnerable to not only what other people think about us, but also to advertising and/or political manipulation.
We have the power to choose, moment by moment, who and how we want to be in the world.
The better we understand the choices we have been making, either consciously or unconsciously, the more say we will have in the world we create. Neurocircuitry may be neurocircuitry, but we don't have to run on automatic.
Just like children, emotions heal when they are heard and validated.
The baby looks at things all day without winking; that is because his eyes are not focused on any particular object. He goes without knowing where he is going, and stops without knowing what he is doing. He merges himself within the surroundings and moves along with it. These are the principles of mental hygiene.
That man over there says that women need to be helped into carriages, and lifted over ditches, and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody ever helps me into carriages, or over mud-puddles, or gives me any best place! And ain't I a woman?
Sleep lingers all our lifetime about our eyes, as night hovers all day in the boughs of the fir-tree.
Everything passes. Nobody gets anything for keeps. And that's how we've got to live.
Even our pets can become idols.
Action is no less necessary than thought to the instinctive tendencies of the human frame.
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