You beat me to it.
A common misunderstanding -especially in the typing community- " feelers don't think and thinkers don't feel.
Wrong. We all have thought, we all have emotion. We do not have control over our immediate emotions are thoughts. What we do have control over is with which we decide to base our choices.
To me the healthiest option is never all one or the other but knowing when obe is more appropriate than the other.
For me, 90% of the time I go with thought and rational, but that isn't always nessecery. Some moments in life really are just about enjoyment. [... snipped]
I agree. Basically, Emotion and Reason should both be considered as input toward any actions/decisions we take. Both Emotion and Reason have strengths and weaknesses, so both are needed for mutual reinforcement.
For example, Emotion is weak in that it tends to be short-term and not good at cost-benefit analysis. As I said in another post, Emotions fill us full of pleasure when we eat candy and ice cream but later react with displeasure when we're fat and ill from eating all that candy and ice cream. It's Reason that puts 2 and 2 together and warns us that we should eat sweets in moderation in order to find that balance between enjoyment and good health.
On the other hand, Reason also has its shortcomings. Reason can lead us to make cost-benefit analyses that argue in favor of eugenics and euthanasia of the sick and elderly. Cost-benefit analysis alone isn't a good way to run a life.
Also, despite being short-term in its operation, Emotions comprise a lifetime of experiences, both good and bad. We have experiences, we store them in our memory, and when we run across something similar in the present we have an instant recall about how we reacted to such experiences in the past: They were fun, they scared us, they made us angry, etc. That's important info, to let us know whether a given decision or action is a good fit for us.
So the best way to react to things is via a mix of Reason and Emotion.
One book I was reading recently ("Designing Your Life: How to Build a Well-Lived, Joyful Life, " by Bill Burnett and Dave Evans, pub. 2016) talked about how to make decisions via a process of "discernment," that is, via a layered approach that uses both Emotion and Reason. That is, start with Reason (gather info, do your due diligence, make cost-benefit analyses), then use your "gut" to decide whether your choice is a good fit.
For example, if you're making a career decision:
First, do step 1): Gather intellectual fodder. Do your homework, take notes, talk to experts, etc. After you've done that, progress to step 2): Use emotional/intuitive/spiritual input as well. This is your "gut" response. This is where you've stored a lifetime of impressions about what's a good fit for you; listen to it. Then add on step 3): "Live your choice." That is, given two or three options, pretend for 1-3 days that you've accepted option A, and run your life as though you were prepping for or living that life. Then do the same for option B, etc. Basically this process of "living your choice" is another way of accessing emotional input: You "live" the options in your head and see if they are a good fit.
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Anyway, the above comments are more about one's decision-making process.
Actually, the start of the thread was about "emotional regulation," which is more about "being socially appropriate," IOW, whether it's appropriate to throw tantrums, act on our raw emotions, etc. Regarding those issues, Wikipedia has articles on both "emotional self-regulation" and "regulation of emotion" (there is a slight difference depending on the context in which the emotion is used).