Emotionally Responsible

Randy Murray in Emotionally Contagious:

Your emotions can and will carry over to the others that surround you. And theirs to you. Be aware of it. Your anger and frustration will breed it in others. Don’t contaminate your friends and family with it. If you sneezed, you’d cover your mouth. Do the same thing for your negative emotions. It won’t do you any good to blast your anger all around you. And it will do others harm.

I like this a lot.

As far as our planet is concerned, we are in charge. No corporeal creature reigns over human beings here. It’s just us. When we look around, so much of the world is the result of our actions. Buildings. Cars. Money. These are things not found in nature. They are here because we put them here.

We decided so much, and I’m not sure it’s all in our best interest. We decided we needed to work eight hours a day. We decided college needed to cost tens of thousands of dollars. We decided big houses and fancy cars are symbols of success. Things are the way they are because we made it so.

I’m reminded of this quote by Steve Jobs (see the video here):

When you grow up you tend to get told the world is the way it is, and your life is just to live your life inside the world. Try not to bash into the walls too much. Try to have a nice family life, have fun, save a little money.

That’s a very limited life. Life can be much broader once you discover one simple fact. And that is, everything around you that you call “life” was made up by people that were no smarter than you. And you can change it, you can influence it, you can build your own things that other people can use.

Once you learn that, you’ll never be the same again.

I like to think that we are responsible not just for the buildings and cars, but also for the energy our planet exudes. That is, the “life” we made up includes everything from physical inventions to our own emotions. We are responsible for all of it.

If we assume an Earth without human beings is a world that exists in a state of natural harmony in accordance with the rest of the universe, then we, as the most sentient of creatures, are responsible for the continuation or disruption of that harmony. We produce not only physical creations, but also metaphysical energy in the form of emotions. Joy. Hatred. Humor. Jealousy. Malice. Pride. These are the byproducts of humanity. Negative energy exists because we allow it to exist. Because we create it. When we choose to fight and compete with one another, we choose to contribute negative energy to the universe. We project it onto each other and off into space.

Like Randy says, emotion — and therefore, energy — is contagious. A healthy person can become ill by being around sick people, but who says a sick person can’t feel better by being surrounded by healthy people? Similarly, enough negativity can drag down even the best of spirits. Why can’t the reverse be true?

Attempting to alter the entire universe’s energy is too big a task for a single person. Our personal energies and emotions, however, are entirely within our control. I’ll worry about me, and you worry about you.

The universe’s collective energy is a matter of individual responsibility.

We each must ask ourselves, “What kind of energy will I project out into the universe today?”