“All emotions are, in essence, impulses to act, the instant plans for handling life…”– Daniel Goldman from his book, “Emotional intelligence” 1995. Daniel comes from a neural-scientific point of view; were talking about raw brain. “…the brain has two memory systems, one for ordinary facts and one for emotionally charged ones,” Goldman again. He quotes Joseph LeDoux from 1989-93.
When alarmed, the amygdala (emotional brain center) sends an urgent message out. “It acts before there is full confirmation.” “It frantically commands that we react to the present, in ways that were imprinted long ago.” What? Yes, Goldman says “the message the amygdala sends is often ‘out of date.’”
In a personal example of this, when I was a child I was placed on a horse with great fear of falling off. I feared horses for years after, and the very childhood fear, when triggered, panicked me again and anew. Problem; with my child’s body, fear made sense; but now I am almost as big as the horse. The fear holds little logic today.
In another instance, a used diaper found in a laundry closet reminds a mom of battlefield casualties from a former nursing tour in the military. She remembers a smell, sees a few faces, a few scenes, she is frantic. In this case also, it’s outdated fear; not relevant at all to the present, but the emotion is still triggered.
Miroslav Volf wrote a book, “The End of Memory.” He speaks of personal memories from interrogations in prison camps. He remarks, “there are too many ways to remember wrongly, perpetuating the evil committed rather than guarding against it.” He makes the point, “We are not just shaped by memories; we ourselves shape the memories that shape us.”
Can we conjecture that emotions cannot be trusted for accuracy? — Let alone to build a life upon? Sadly, many do this very thing.
So, let’s go deeper; “Emotional outbursts often date from a time early in our lives when things were bewildering and we did not yet have words for comprehending events.” Goldman calls them; “…wordless blueprints for emotional life.” Nevertheless, “life without the amygdala is a life stripped of personal meaning.” “Lacking emotional weight, encounters lose their hold.” Goldman
Wow! What do we do with our misshaped emoto-concepts? God’s Word teaches that they are not to be trusted. Neural science seems to teach the same. Do we agree with these observations?
Let’s summarize simply. Memory-built emotional outputs result from unreliable past stuff; but without these emotions, life loses meaning, identity suffers. Well, Biblically speaking, the picture is even worse. Why? – because all of our observations; emotional, mental, conscience-wise or other, distort because of the fall of mankind by way of Adam and Eve’s sin. Together with owning an old sin nature, we have thoughts, impressions, and feelings rooted in our unconscious mind from the whole history of mankind — Sown in from the Father of Lies before Salvation.
How do we fix the broken man? First, it’s clear we need a whole set of new basics to work with and to fill up with. I, a fallible human, require the kind of apparatus that works with God-content. I necessitate God-equipment because it takes God to know God. I demand grace, for grace. I must have a grace basket that fits grace outpourings. I require hunger toward God-eatables.
With new capacity, the heavenly manna is caught. It goes into my cycle of new mind and produces fresh amygdala content, overriding the body-of-deaths’ chincy capacity. Quickening takes place.
Friends, the old stuff can’t be repaired. Don’t buy that self-actualization kit. We don’t want to see someone’s liberated flesh. We ain’t interested in your self-depreciated capacity, your new-found quirks of orientation, or that new drug on the market. We want to help people, but we don’t buy the cheap garbage. It reeks of independence from God.
Love revitalizes a broken person; is the filler and the container. Grace holds the receptacle together for the love shedding abroad. We exist and feel brand new not by standing on our own. No, as receivers we stay, near the fountain, in the family, under the shadow. In utter dependence we thrive. It’s all in The Book. Love ya