How do thoughts and feelings relate?
It’s often claimed that thoughts evoke feelings, leading many to see ‘thinking’ as undesirable. Thoughts can certainly evoke feelings, especially when they are repetitive or amplified by a racing mind. They can (often) lead to dissatisfaction but can also (less frequently) lead to joy or amusement.
However, in the present moment, especially when interacting with others, and in those times when we are less ‘awake’ and thus react almost automatically to our surroundings, our feelings are always first. They are triggered by something outside us. Our feelings operate incredibly faster than our thoughts. Our feelings are much quicker than our Reason. Therefore, a thought cannot precede it.
Ouspensky wrote that feelings are thousands of times faster than reason, but unfortunately, this can’t be calculated. However, I have experienced that feelings are much faster than thoughts can arise, and that they always act as the driving force behind our mental processes.
Our rapid emotional response to, for instance, an unpleasant comment or undesired situation is certainly felt by us, but in an unconscious state it’s not truly perceived. We feel something due to some stimulus, and our mind quickly tries to interpret it to remain in our comfort zone, triggering various thoughts. This original and misunderstood – because not properly observed – emotional signal is then compounded with various sub-feelings. This is why it’s often said that thoughts create feelings. This seems accurate when we are in a ‘waking sleep’, but in reality, it’s the other way around, which we only notice when we are fully conscious. With these thought streams, we evoke secondary feelings like irritation, anger, aggression, as well as despondency, depression, and fear.
In the present moment, a thought doesn’t have the power to ‘just’ evoke a strong feeling because our mind (Manas) is always associative in response to a stimulus, often something external. Our unconscious thinking can’t do otherwise. Our misunderstood emotional impulse comes from within and is triggered by something external, some kind of stimulus: it’s like we receive an ’emotional jab’ that we don’t understand and often don’t even really perceive. We are touched in our deepest emotional center. Often, the emotion reacts to something ‘old’ that’s brought up by a new situation. Our thoughts then try to understand or interpret this uncomfortable feeling, to place it, mainly to return to our comfort zone. As a result, we remain unaware of the original (and very important) emotional impulse. We then only feel the superficial (secondary) emotions that our thoughts evoke and intensify.
Our reaction will then focus on the trigger, the cause of our upset, and not on the underlying actual reason, which could be something very old. This way, we’ll project our feelings onto the other person or the situation that triggered us. We then direct our attention outward instead of inward, with anger, indignation, etc. Almost every conflict arises from this mechanism that we fail to perceive. Once we perceive it, with our Observer, our inner attitude towards the world will gradually change, and we no longer conflict with ourselves and the outside world.
Becoming Silent
That’s why it’s crucial to pause at the initial feeling, not to ‘move’ within it (not think about it, not immediately react), and if possible, discern the origin of this feeling, which is different from its immediate cause. With practice, you can do this instantly without heavily disrupting or halting your interaction in the moment: >observe >recognize >respond correctly, and potentially set aside the insight (or the question ‘what’s happening inside me?’) for a later reflective moment in which it can be silently felt and understood. In this way, feelings can fulfill their true function. They are messengers from our essence and inform us about what we need to understand at that level. Feelings are the language of our soul.
Feelings provide us with invaluable information about ourselves, our personal formation, and our thinking can be functionally deployed to interpret everything. By functional thinking, I mean our magnificent mental instrument Manas) that associates in full perception, thus ‘gathering’ information (Citta) and examines. This type of thinking is intelligent and creative. It invents and deduces. It clarifies confusion and ambiguities. In Silence, it guides us from ‘comprehending’ (head) to ‘understanding’ (heart), leading to true self-knowledge.
Ignoring or rationalizing feelings is unwise, depriving us of essential information on how to become whole and undivided. It keeps us asleep and preserves our ego (i.e., our identifications). Feelings are not there for us to reason away with our intellect. They serve a purpose. We shouldn’t sweep any emotion under the rug using ‘spiritual insight’. We should learn to understand them.
Recklessly expressing negative feelings is also inadvisable, as it hinders our ability to perceive, understand, and reassess them. This way, they won’t be resolved, maintaining our inner confinement. So, stop expressing negativity. And start giving up unwanted internal mechanisms and habits and surrendering them.
Our negative feelings are neither wrong nor right; they have an essential purpose. Our feelings, whether positive or negative, are the language of our essence. However, we can always perceive right and wrong in the context of our goal: achieving inner freedom. What brings us closer to this goal is good, and what takes us away from it, is wrong.
Wrong is to avoid facing these feelings, not examining their true cause, which is different from the direct trigger. Otherwise, we’d project our dissatisfaction onto others (or perceive it as self-rejection). Others, consequently caught in the same inner quagmire of emotions, will further escalate the tension. This is how conflicts and wars arise. Naturally, this can only occur in unconsciousness, in identifications with ideas about oneself or others.
Right is to truly feel these emotions (in a real action) in a profound silence of thoughts, observed by the awake Observer within us. Then, the causes of these feelings may arise in our minds because our Manas (our associational faculty) from Citta (our collective and personal memory) then associates purely, presenting findings to our Buddhi (our highest discerning faculty). From the true and liberating insights we gain, arises both immense inner strength and a diminishment of our negatively inclined ‘self’ prone to express these feelings through projections and disapprovals.
It’s not wrong to also observe positive feelings in this silent manner. All feelings that move us significantly and hence out of an inner silence, need to be seen and re-evaluated for what they convey or for their true worth.
