Emotional Investment

[Frosty]

How do you decide how much you care about something? IS it a conscious decision for you? Do you compartmentalize your feelings- able to detach easily from any situation no matter how emotionally charged?

Im not able to do this easily. If something is WRONG in my book, no matter how emotionally charged- I dont feel it is necessarily ok for me to back down. It reminds me of the idea of ‘selfishly only doing the ‘right thing’ when its easy for me’ which means... well. Its just not something Im ok with.

But I think thats because everything is emotionaly charged to me. Everything. Everything has some sort of emotional value. And where I see backing down as cowardice, for some, it seems NT types especially- its just common sense/self preservation.

So what about you? How do you decide how much you emotionally invest into something? Is it conscious?

 

[Red Memories]

How do you decide how much you care about something: To be honest I am not really aware until I am confronted with it. Then my mind kind of goes either "FUCK NO" or "okay...I guess" or something.

Is it conscious?: Not really. I couldn't explain why I personally feel strongly about immodesty of my own fashion and care little about what someone else wears.

Do you compartmentalize?: Some may joke I am completely incapable of this. I do not detach easily at all.

 

[prplchknz]

How do you decide how much you care about something?I don't
IS it a conscious decision for you? no
Do you compartmentalize your feelings- able to detach easily from any situation no matter how emotionally charged? I can too a point which if it's big i detach myself pretty easily, but if it's something small i have a harder time doing so, it's like my brain gets overloaded with major stuff that it's like fuck this shit and goes ladeeda.

 

[Qlip]

How do you decide how much you care about something? IS it a conscious decision for you? Do you compartmentalize your feelings- able to detach easily from any situation no matter how emotionally charged?

Im not able to do this easily. If something is WRONG in my book, no matter how emotionally charged- I dont feel it is necessarily ok for me to back down. It reminds me of the idea of ‘selfishly only doing the ‘right thing’ when its easy for me’ which means... well. Its just not something Im ok with.

But I think thats because everything is emotionaly charged to me. Everything. Everything has some sort of emotional value. And where I see backing down as cowardice, for some, it seems NT types especially- its just common sense/self preservation.

So what about you? How do you decide how much you emotionally invest into something? Is it conscious?

I can't exactly control my emotional investment, but I can often tell that I'm heading into a brick wall or completely unnecessary pain. I feel like what you're describing are various reactions to feeling threatened, we can lash out, we can dig in, or we can walk away. And walking away definitely feels like failure, nobody likes failure. Personally I try to inject a sense of proportion into the self-dialog. Is this is important, whatever it is I'm reacting to, how important is it? Is it more important than say, chilling out and watching an episode of Westworld with zero stress? Is the best way to address the issue to rail at it/be stubborn, or is it to instead of being reactive, be proactive. The latter is a pretty important distinction for me, being proactive has different hooks for me than being reactive. Building something feels more centered and rewarding than defending something, and can often solve the same problems.

As far as how I get to some sort of removed state where I can examine this stuff. Fucked if I know. My partner has been talking a lot about some people's inability to calm down on their own, beyond an outside interlocutor, being self-soothing; It's a thing we could learn as infants, but some of us never pick up. One of the goto's as late-learning self soothing are somatic exercises, breathing exercises and movement exercises. Sometimes the best access to our inner state is our outer state. Seemingly.

 

[xXxXx_wEltschmErz_xXxXx]

It comes automatically. But I do think I can do that detachment stuff pretty decently.

 

[Snow as White]

How do you decide how much you care about something? IS it a conscious decision for you? Do you compartmentalize your feelings- able to detach easily from any situation no matter how emotionally charged?

I don't decide how much I care about something - it just happens. But I do find that the older I get, the more able I am to choose how I respond to this caring I now feel. When I was younger I would so easily go full speed ahead, not caring or noticing cliffs ahead. This is mainly to do with caring about people, and not understanding that sometimes it isn't worth it.

It doesn't always work, this choosing. My emotions are still really good at getting into the driver's seat. I sort of need like a buffer of time to process what I am feeling and then decide if I want to just go the direction that the river wants to go, or if I want to try this nice road that may follow the river on occasion, but also meanders through the woods sometimes.

I find it easier to compartmentalize if I see that something has higher priority. Like, a few years ago I had to put a pet down. The pet was old and starting to get health issues. My vet gave me the choice. My initial response was that I was murdering my pet and how would they ever forgive me should we meet again in the great beyond and I say, hey let's go explore that star over there and they are like pfft murrrrrderrrrrrrrerrrrrr. Then I was able to reframe that my pet was sick and not going to get better and that regardless of how I felt, putting them down was the better course of action.

But I think thats because everything is emotionaly charged to me. Everything. Everything has some sort of emotional value. And where I see backing down as cowardice, for some, it seems NT types especially- its just common sense/self preservation.

I think that this is a bit of a misrepresentation that just because it seems easy for some types to do this, that it doesn't cost them something. My bf is an INFJ 5 and so he is much more calm/stoic than I am, and can come off as cold at times. He just has a priority system that sees things differently than I do, and his system is better able to see where emotion interferes with what is right. It doesn't mean he isn't emotional or that he doesn't value emotions. Or that it doesn't affect him to choose against the emotions. He just sees more beyond the initial moment of emotions, whereas I so often get stuck in their sticky swamp and think that the swamp is all life, all sky.

 

[Madboot]

Sometimes I surprise myself with how much I care about certain things. If I believe something is going pull me away from things that are really important to me (namely my family), I will make a conscious effort to compartmentalize those feelings. That is much easier said than done though and I only do this if the situation is a negative one. The ability to compartmentalize is a skill, and like all skills it must be practiced to be perfected. I truly sucked at this when I was a young man. Now I've gotten pretty good at it.

 

[á´…eparted]

Me caring or not is more or less automatic. I seldom have to contemplate it. Upon prompting, I can explain the details behind it an why I made the decision, so it's not flippant, but I also don't need to think about it as I know my brain knows what it needs to know on the matter.

As a general rule, I care (a lot) about anything I get involved in. I will never be scolded for not caring enough .

 

[ceecee]

Sometimes I surprise myself with how much I care about certain things. If I believe something is going pull me away from things that are really important to me (namely my family), I will make a conscious effort to compartmentalize those feelings. That is much easier said than done though and I only do this if the situation is a negative one. The ability to compartmentalize is a skill, and like all skills it must be practiced to be perfected. I truly sucked at this when I was a young man. Now I've gotten pretty good at it.

Yeah this. But I'm very good at compartmentalizing, always have been. I can't control how emotionally invested I will get in something but I can tell when it's a - this is going to end badly - situation and act accordingly. Of course I have feelings like this....

But I don't act on them.

My partner has been talking a lot about some people's inability to calm down on their own, beyond an outside interlocutor, being self-soothing; It's a thing we could learn as infants, but some of us never pick up. One of the goto's as late-learning self soothing are somatic exercises, breathing exercises and movement exercises. Sometimes the best access to our inner state is our outer state. Seemingly.

This this this....I see it more and more. Not so much in the generation anyone would think either. Boomers. Gen Xers and people my age just suck at self soothing in everyday life. Hard to say how that came to be. There is a Relax function on my Fit Bit that takes 2 minutes. Everyone should be using something like it.

 

[Z Buck McFate]

How do you decide how much you care about something?

I'm inclined to use the word discern instead of decide, because my "caring" or attachment of/to something for the most part happens on its own. My job is simply to honestly discern how much of it is going on and whether ultimately it's a worthwhile attachment for me.

IS it a conscious decision for you?

I think there's a natural inclination to form an attachment to someone with a schema that fits well with our own (ie. codependent person will form attachment to narcissist -and vice versa - because it feels like a good, comfortable 'fit'), and also to form attachments to others in our proximity (over time). The conscious idea to work on not 'fitting well' with a narcissist or changing one's own environment to control who we form attachments to is a conscious decision, but forming attachments in and of itself is an unconscious need that happens on its own. That's why we form unhealthy attachments when we aren't mindful about the things that lead to feelings of attachment.

Unhealthy attachments are usually the consequence of not being aware of actual needs. For example, hoarding is a very strong emotional attachment to stuff - it happens because the person's ability to connect to others in a healthy, secure way is broken.

Do you compartmentalize your feelings- able to detach easily from any situation no matter how emotionally charged?

As an observer of conflict it's easy for me to detach and look for an objective perspective. But that flies out the window when I get personally involved or targeted - I don't trust my own perspective while there's an emotional charge, and it often takes an unreasonable amount of time for a strong emotional charge in me to dissipate. So as soon as a strong emotional charge hits, my instinct is to try to compartmentalize my emotions and withdraw (at the first opportunity) and figure out why it's happening. That's my unconscious instinct. it fails horribly when it's not available to withdraw from interaction with someone or physically distance myself from whatever is triggering me. But I'm consciously trying to cultivate a sense of detachment so that I can hear almost anything without getting hooked by it.

This paragraph is coming to mind (from The Buddha Is Still Teaching, by Jack Cornfield) :

We create big problems for ourselves by not recognizing [emotional charges] when they arrive dressed up in stories. They are like the neighbor’s children disguised as Halloween ghosts. When we open the door and find the child next door dressed in a sheet, even though it looks like a ghost, we remember it is simply the child next door. And when I remember the dramas of my life are the [emotional charges] of the mind dressed in the sheet of a story, I manage them more gracefully.​

 

[highlander]

How do you decide how much you care about something?

I used to get worked up about a lot more things. Angry about people who were a pain in the ass at work. Angry at bad drivers and bad traffic. Embarrassed if I made a mistake. Worrying about looking bad. Etc. As I've gotten older, I'm just more mellow about stuff. I can still get pretty intense and worked up at times but it's like a storm that quickly passes and I move on not dwelling about things so much. Life is short. Might as well enjoy it and make the best of things. I lost my phone tonight. I really bothered me. I completely rely on it. What will I do? How will I wake up in the morning? What will I do on an airplane when I'm waiting for it to take off? How will I know what my schedule is during the day? How will I make phone calls? How will I get into my computer at work? What if someone tries to get in touch with me? Etc. Losing things always bothers me more than most people. Anyway, I ended up writing a list of all the things I would need to do for the next few days because I wont' have said phone and am looking forward to getting a new one.

IS it a conscious decision for you?

Not really that I think about but then you begin to act on reflex after a period of time. I do not dwell over stuff too much anymore.

Do you compartmentalize your feelings- able to detach easily from any situation no matter how emotionally charged?

I probably am able to compartmentalize naturally in some respects but I don't really know. Understanding my feelings in an introspective way has never been my strong suit.

 

[Coriolis]

How do you decide how much you care about something? IS it a conscious decision for you? Do you compartmentalize your feelings- able to detach easily from any situation no matter how emotionally charged?

Im not able to do this easily. If something is WRONG in my book, no matter how emotionally charged- I dont feel it is necessarily ok for me to back down. It reminds me of the idea of ‘selfishly only doing the ‘right thing’ when its easy for me’ which means... well. Its just not something Im ok with.

But I think thats because everything is emotionaly charged to me. Everything. Everything has some sort of emotional value. And where I see backing down as cowardice, for some, it seems NT types especially- its just common sense/self preservation.

So what about you? How do you decide how much you emotionally invest into something? Is it conscious?

There are different levels or perhaps aspects of caring. One level is according something importance and assigning a value judgment to it, as in: "it's wrong for my office mate to badmouth people she doesn't like in the office". This is important because it affects the climate at work, and I have put her behavior in the "bad, should stop/be corrected" category. The other level is when I make a personal investment in trying to achieve what I think is right. So, if I decide to take it upon myself to approach my office mate and get her to stop this behavior, I would be making an emotional investment in it.

In this sense, my degree of emotional investment is directly linked to how much I personally am willing to engage with the issue to affect it. You might think that I will engage when I feel a high degree of emotional investment, but it is actually the opposite. I allow myself to become emotionally invested when I make the choice to become involved. That choice is made based on a combination of the other level of investment - I see a situation that I consider wrong or needing fixed/improved - and my ability to make an impact.

A great illustration is all those commercials we see for helping starving children overseas, or abused animals at home. On the first level, I acknowledge that these are both serious problems. No child should go without basic needs, and no animal should be abused. But I cannot fix these. Sure, I can donate my $15 a month or whatever the commercial is asking for, but I already donate more than that to other causes which I consider equally important, some of which are closer to home. Given that we cannot solve every problem, I choose the ones on which I can have the greatest impact, and (a significant point here) let the rest go, emotionally as well as in my actions. I might return to one of them at a later date, when progress has been made elsewhere. I find allowing myself to become emotionally invested in a situation that I am not in a position to affect is just wasted energy, energy that I should direct somewhere I can make a difference.

 

[Yuurei]

What??
....either I care about it or I don't.

I mean. If I were to put in the effort to wonder why I don't care about something than that would be caring.

If I do not care about something I do not put in the effort to wonder about it.

 

[Mind Maverick]

How do you decide how much you care about something? IS it a conscious decision for you? Do you compartmentalize your feelings- able to detach easily from any situation no matter how emotionally charged?

Im not able to do this easily. If something is WRONG in my book, no matter how emotionally charged- I dont feel it is necessarily ok for me to back down. It reminds me of the idea of ‘selfishly only doing the ‘right thing’ when its easy for me’ which means... well. Its just not something Im ok with.

But I think thats because everything is emotionaly charged to me. Everything. Everything has some sort of emotional value. And where I see backing down as cowardice, for some, it seems NT types especially- its just common sense/self preservation.

So what about you? How do you decide how much you emotionally invest into something? Is it conscious?

It's rather relative to specifics to me, but...there are methods, tactics. It's easy to detach or attach using perspectives, focal points, methods, etc. in some things such as people/relationships once I've gotten to a certain point in things...in others, such as interests or passions...not so much. That's because there has to be a good reason involved, and of course...there never really is a good reason to leave behind an interest because it's harmless. However, even this can be done. We all can somewhat build our minds how we want to, really. It's just all a matter of perspectives, priorities, etc.

For example, if you had a different perspective (and thus value) than

It reminds me of the idea of ‘selfishly only doing the ‘right thing’ when its easy for me’ which means... well. Its just not something Im ok with.

the obstruction of detachment wouldn't interfere.

...and after you realize you have control over your perspectives...

welcome to the quest for universal truth, often times.

 

[Mind Maverick]

What??
....either I care about it or I don't.

I mean. If I were to put in the effort to wonder why I don't care about something than that would be caring.

If I do not care about something I do not put in the effort to wonder about it.

But you can also care about caring about something, thus desiring to no longer care, thus altering whether or not you do...disagree?

 

[The Cat]

How do you decide how much you care about something?
“`Cheshire Puss,’ [Alice] began, rather timidly, as she did not at all know whether it would like the name: however, it only grinned a little wider. `Come, it’s pleased so far,’ thought Alice, and she went on. `Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?’
`That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,’ said the Cat.
`I don’t much care where–‘ said Alice.
`Then it doesn’t matter which way you go,’ said the Cat.
`–so long as I get SOMEWHERE,’ Alice added as an explanation.
`Oh, you’re sure to do that,’ said the Cat, `if you only walk long enough.'”

IS it a conscious decision for you?
“Oh, you can't help that,' said the cat. 'We're all mad here.”

Do you compartmentalize your feelings- able to detach easily from any situation no matter how emotionally charged?
“I don't like the looks of it,' said the King: 'however, it may kiss my hand, if it likes.'
'I'd rather not,' the Cat remarked.”

 

[Agent Washington]

I've lost enough that I pretty much can learn to care and not to care at the same time. Duality of man.