I’m not sure how I interpret this. I am much more apt to show my feelings as I get older. As a kid I would bottle every emotion and attempt stoicism so I didn’t look uncool or embarrassed or sad. These days I will be much more likely to show emotion unless doing so would be some sort of unprofessional or faux pas. To me that feels like the opposite of control of feelings.
Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?
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Re: Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?
#142My entirely unscientific theory is that like other cells, we're born with a limited number of fucks in our body. When we're young, we (instinctively, subconsciously) feel like our fucks reserves are plentiful, so we give a fuck about a lot of stuff. As we get older, our reservoir of fucks gets progressively depleted. The fucks are rarer, so we give a fuck less and less often. I've recently turned 40 and I can definit…
No doubt there's some of that. Perspective is another other thing. Once you start to see how the world works, and how complicated things are, you're a lot less likely to fire off about some specific issue. Radicalism is the posture of those who want to externalize all the side effects of their utopianism, and when you're older it gets harder to not see second-order effects for what they are.
Radicalism can also be a reaction to systems that claim to be perfect but unsurprisingly fail, on the other hand.
Re: Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?
#143> When older people say, “This is the best time of your life, enjoy it while you can,” that’s a form of abuse. I guess that these days anything can be called "abuse".
The issue that I have seen with this phrase being used is that it is often used in response to a younger person complaining about their current life or aspects of their life. The implication of the phrase is then "well your life sucks, but it's only going to get worse". For a real life example, I knew someone who was going through some pretty serious depression in high school. Responding to which their counselor said…
> For a real life example, I knew someone who was going through some pretty serious depression in high school. Responding to which their counselor said something along the lines of "you shouldn't be sad, this is the best time of your life". Which was pretty devastating thing to say to someone.
And, for a lot of people, it's just not true. Maybe I'm really fortunate, but I can't remember a better time in my past life. I think for a lot of people, things generally get better as you age. You definitely get more autonomy, compared to when you were a child and teenager. Financially, you get established in your career, you save a little money, maybe you can even afford a home. Socially, you have better, closer friends as you get older. You can worry less and less about what other people think of you as you get older. I guess this is a little privilege showing, but generally I think my mental wellbeing is much better now than when I was a child or teenager.
High School was the absolute worst point in my life, and that's true for a lot of people I know. You lack autonomy, you're bored, you have no money, you're in a prison-like institution getting bullied for most of your weekday. You're under a lot of pressure and have to worry about grades and behaving the way adults want you to behave. It sucked! Who are these insane people where high school was the best time of their life?
Re: Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?
#144My entirely unscientific theory is that like other cells, we're born with a limited number of fucks in our body. When we're young, we (instinctively, subconsciously) feel like our fucks reserves are plentiful, so we give a fuck about a lot of stuff. As we get older, our reservoir of fucks gets progressively depleted. The fucks are rarer, so we give a fuck less and less often. I've recently turned 40 and I can definit…
I don't know if I'm getting older or the years of beer drinking have caught up on me.
But emotions don't feel as raw/immediate as they used to feel when I was younger.
Re: Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?
#145At age 20 or so, I read a quote in a book (on day trading, IIRC) that went something like: "Master your emotions, or they will master you." After thinking about it, I realized that despite identifying as a logical-thinking individual, I was nevertheless at the mercy of the more primitive parts of my brain. Sometimes totally, but pretty much all executive functions were influenced by it to a large degree. That might b…
If I ever got something beneficial out of meditation, it was that feelings and thoughts come and go and do not have to necessarily be listened to. I didn't realise this until I was in my early 20s, and looking back, there were so many regretful moments as a result of just doing whatever feelings and thoughts dictated I should do in any given moment. Being able to view your thoughts and feelings in an abstract, manage…
Whole heartedly agree with this post. I didn't start meditating until my mid-20s and am just grateful to have discovered the practice at all.
Instead of swimming in your thoughts/emotions all day, meditation teaches you how temporary and fleeting they are. This helps you detach from them and not take your own thoughts so personally (if that makes sense). It's like you have a 50,000 foot view above your thoughts as they come and go.
Re: Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?
#146It's just from feeling more right? When I was 9 the best pizza I'd ever had came from a Walmart food court. Now that I'm closer to 30 I'm had a lot more pizza that was far better and far worse than that pizza. If I were to eat that same pizza again it probably wouldnt taste better than any pizza I've ever had. My experience is informed by past experience. Just like my emotional reaction is informed by past emotional…
I think you're onto something here in certain ways, but the expanding relative emotional scale idea doesn't explain why the young tend to be the thrill-seekers and the old tend to enjoy more of the "simple pleasures" of life. If the Wal-Mart pizza were the main factor, it seems to me we'd expect to see the reverse: the young would be more content with the simple, but as they got bored over time, they'd seek greater a…
Oh interesting. I think the same is true for thrill seeking but there is an added element which is perspective. When I was young I feared little and did stupid things, sometimes to disastrous results. Now I know I could do those stupid things if I'd like but I'm also more aware of the potential results.
Young people know some of the things they are doing are stupid but until you feel it yourself its hard to really know it right?
There is also an element of realizing that certain highs are not actually satisfying in the long term. When I was younger I thought X would make me happy. Now I realize that X is very unlikely to actually improve my overall happiness. Some people never realize this or they stumble into taking drugs which is in some ways does cause them to seek greater thrills/highs but they typically don't make it very long in that lifestyle.
Re: Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?
#147My entirely unscientific theory is that like other cells, we're born with a limited number of fucks in our body. When we're young, we (instinctively, subconsciously) feel like our fucks reserves are plentiful, so we give a fuck about a lot of stuff. As we get older, our reservoir of fucks gets progressively depleted. The fucks are rarer, so we give a fuck less and less often. I've recently turned 40 and I can definit…
The thing about getting older is that you come with terms with the fact that you have limited control over life. You have only control on yourself, and this not absolute because you may get a decease that's pretty random, although your lifestyle heavily affects your well being. Outside of yourself everything else is kinda out of your influence. It's good to keep tabs on what's going on with the world in an attempt to better prepare for hardship, but the more you let go the happier you become.
Re: Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?
#148I have a 1 month-old baby at home right now. God, talk about not having control of one's feelings.
Re: Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?
#149I'm 61.
I question whether it's greater control of my feelings, as against, more recognition that feelings come and go and don't require that we act on them.
The study and practice of non-dualism and other ancient Indian regions has been helpful to me. I'm generally at ease in the world.
Re: Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?
#150Ray Dalio, "Another one of those"