Reason cannot calm the storm of emotion, and emotion usually wins, until it settles down and allows reason to rise again and apologize on behalf of it.
When there is a fight of reason versus emotion and the mind wonders which one to follow, in most times, emotion wins over reason. But it is reason that should win and emotion shouldn't.
Human beings are powered by emotion, not by reason. Study after study has proven that if the emotion centers of our brain are damaged in some way, we don't just lose the ability to laugh or cry, we lose the ability to make decisions. Alarm bells for every business right there. The neurologist Donald Calne puts it brilliantly: “The essential difference between emotion and reason is that emotion leads to action while reason leads to conclusions.”
Reason connot defeat emotion, an emotion can only be displaced or overcome by a stronger emotion.
The essential difference between emotion and reason is that emotion leads to action while reason leads to conclusions.
Emotion without reason lets people walk all over you; reason without emotion is a mask for cruelty.
An emotion is only an emotion. It's just a small part of your whole being. You are much more than your emotion. An emotion comes, stays for a while, and goes away, just like a storm. If you're aware of that, you won't be afraid of your emotions.
Were we incapable of empathy – of putting ourselves in the position of others and seeing that their suffering is like our own – then ethical reasoning would lead nowhere. If emotion without reason is blind, then reason without emotion is impotent.
No emotion, merely as an emotion, is a sin, because we cannot directly control the arising of an emotion in our soul.
Mostly what I try to do is build emotion. Only I'd prefer not to do it by telling you about emotion but by pushing that emotion down.
What is immutable about Sherlock Holmes? He favors reason over emotion, but actually underneath that, there is a lot of emotion going on. You can't suddenly make him ordinary because he would hate that. He's not suddenly going to be somebody else.
Reason must be the universal rule and guide; all things must be done according to reason without allowing oneself to be swayed by emotion.
Imbalance of reason and emotion may explain the tenacity of religion in societies: world religions are optimized to tap into the emotional networks, and great arguments of reason amount to little against such magnetic pull.
One of the things this world is finding is that emotion is the basis of reason. We really have to trust our emotions, which are much smarter than our reason in some ways.
Tulips come up in spring for no reason. Of course, you planted bulbs and now in April the earth warms up. But why? For no reason except gravity. Why gravity? For no reason. And why did you plant red tulip bulbs to begin with? For beauty, which is itself and has no reason. So the world is empty. Things rise and fall for no reason. And what a great opportunity that is! You can start writing again at any minute. Let go of all your failures and sit down and write something great. Or write something terrible and feel great about it.
If you have just an emotion, you would not necessarily feel it. To feel an emotion, you need to represent in the brain in structures that are actually different from the structures that lead to the emotion, what is going on in the organs when you're having the emotion.
Brush and ink are only servants of thoughts and emotion. They should follow your emotion and change with the emotion.