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I agree. I find that the healthiest people in my life don't seem to be the types prone to endless rumination. I think this is where meditation (and stoicism)

I agree. I find that the healthiest people in my life don't seem to be the types prone to endless rumination. I think this is where meditation (and stoicism) deviates from some types of psychotherapy and most support groups. Meditation teaches you to look at feelings dispassionately, which helps you lessen their power. This is very different than treating each emotion as if it is "correct" and in need of resolution via lots of introspection.

whatshisface 7y ago
If the healthier people have by definition less emotional suffering, then of course they're going to complain less.
- tachyonbeam 7y ago
  I second this. We all have unique brains, and it seems to me that some people are naturally less prone to anxiety than others. I know plenty of people who seem to have naturally low anxiety, and as far as I can tell, they never needed to have some profound realization to become like this, they were likely born this way, they have lucky genetics. Anxiety means your brain has more of a tendency to worry about potential threats. Possibly because your amygdala are more easily activated. It may just be that, back when we lived in the savannah, being easily aroused by potential threats, and being overly careful, was in many ways beneficial for survival. However, we live in a time of relative safety, and it seems that being someone who worries a lot about potential threats is not generally a useful trait. I'm not saying that there's nothing you can do to manage anxiety, that is obviously false, but I'm saying there's a strong genetic component, and that judging people who appear more anxious and telling them just suck it up shows a fundamental lack of self-awareness and understanding of how the human brain works.
  - lanstin 7y ago
    I agree: one's goal has to be to create a fulfilling life (whatever that means to one) with the nervous system you actually have. Wishing things away rarely works with mental/emotional realities. There's many ways to manage the reality of your specific self; e.g., I'm pretty anxious, so I start every day I can with a nice relaxing bath, during which I am free of anxiety. However, I don't try to make myself be free of anxiety when I have to speak up in some tense situation; then I use mindfulness techniques to just be aware and persist despite it all. Sometimes I do things to change my internal self, sometimes I just treat it like a person that needs certain random things to be at top performance. It depends.
  - roganartu 7y ago
    I'll throw my anecdotal experience in life thus far in the ring. I turned 30 this year and I haven't really ever experienced anything more than mild stress, and even that is fairly infrequent (once or twice a year at most, and always because there is something that a reasonable person would say is worth stressing over). I have been this way my entire life and as far as I'm aware it didn't come about from some life experience, I think I was just born like this. My mother used to laugh that everything was "like water off a duck's back" to me. All throughout school and University I never once was stressed about any piece of assessment or any exams. There were a few I was woefully unprepared for and knew I would likely fail, but it never really bothered me. It wasn't that I didn't care, I just never saw the point in worrying as worrying is never going to change anything. My wife is the opposite. She stresses about everything, many things that are completely out of her control. I have learnt a lot about how to support someone in that frame of mind, even when I don't understand why they are stressed. This does have downsides. Many people, especially in professional contexts, mistake my stress free and easygoing nature as laziness. I also have relatively low empathy, though I'm not sure if that's a side effect, cause, or completely unrelated.
  - ekr 7y ago
    I've studied the area of developmental psychology a lot, and all evidence points to neuroticism, anxiety being not genetic but a result of developmental trauma. Adverse childhood experiences, missatunemenmet with the primary caregiver leads to an area of the brain responsible with affect regulation not being developed properly. Infants learn to regulate affect from parents (the mother or the primary caregiver).
- 77pt77 7y ago
  Another case of reverse causation.
zozbot234 7y ago
I thought that the way "introspection" is supposed to work was as a way of asking oneself: "wait, why am I feeling this emotion in the first place? Where does it bottom out, so to say?" Because that in turn tells you what strings to pull at in order to "resolve" the emotion in a comprehensive way. While this cannot be done without regarding the emotion as at least putatively "correct", I'd say that it's far from incompatible with a Stoicism-inspired approach, properly understood.
- josinalvo 7y ago
  I think you need to understand the origins of the emotion, but you can (after understanding it) see it as mistaken. Say you are pissed because you did not finish a job, but your job performance is increasingly better. Your emotion is not guiding you anywhere useful. It can be useful to understand dispassionately, and then choose to endorse it (that is, this seems a feeling that points to a correct direction, I will thing about solutions) or not (that is, this seems a feeling that does not point to where I want to go, thank you for your message, but I would rather not act on it). Sometimes feelings are mistakes, like a optical illusion. Sometimes they are not.
BeetleB 7y ago
>I find that the healthiest people in my life don't seem to be the types prone to endless rumination. Rumination is unhealthy. And believe it or not, one of the antidotes to it is being able to communicate ones feelings effectively. In my experience, more expressive people tend not to suffer ruminating thoughts.

whatshisface 7y ago

If the healthier people have by definition less emotional suffering, then of course they're going to complain less.

tachyonbeam 7y ago
I second this. We all have unique brains, and it seems to me that some people are naturally less prone to anxiety than others. I know plenty of people who seem to have naturally low anxiety, and as far as I can tell, they never needed to have some profound realization to become like this, they were likely born this way, they have lucky genetics. Anxiety means your brain has more of a tendency to worry about potential threats. Possibly because your amygdala are more easily activated. It may just be that, back when we lived in the savannah, being easily aroused by potential threats, and being overly careful, was in many ways beneficial for survival. However, we live in a time of relative safety, and it seems that being someone who worries a lot about potential threats is not generally a useful trait. I'm not saying that there's nothing you can do to manage anxiety, that is obviously false, but I'm saying there's a strong genetic component, and that judging people who appear more anxious and telling them just suck it up shows a fundamental lack of self-awareness and understanding of how the human brain works.
- lanstin 7y ago
  I agree: one's goal has to be to create a fulfilling life (whatever that means to one) with the nervous system you actually have. Wishing things away rarely works with mental/emotional realities. There's many ways to manage the reality of your specific self; e.g., I'm pretty anxious, so I start every day I can with a nice relaxing bath, during which I am free of anxiety. However, I don't try to make myself be free of anxiety when I have to speak up in some tense situation; then I use mindfulness techniques to just be aware and persist despite it all. Sometimes I do things to change my internal self, sometimes I just treat it like a person that needs certain random things to be at top performance. It depends.
- roganartu 7y ago
  I'll throw my anecdotal experience in life thus far in the ring. I turned 30 this year and I haven't really ever experienced anything more than mild stress, and even that is fairly infrequent (once or twice a year at most, and always because there is something that a reasonable person would say is worth stressing over). I have been this way my entire life and as far as I'm aware it didn't come about from some life experience, I think I was just born like this. My mother used to laugh that everything was "like water off a duck's back" to me. All throughout school and University I never once was stressed about any piece of assessment or any exams. There were a few I was woefully unprepared for and knew I would likely fail, but it never really bothered me. It wasn't that I didn't care, I just never saw the point in worrying as worrying is never going to change anything. My wife is the opposite. She stresses about everything, many things that are completely out of her control. I have learnt a lot about how to support someone in that frame of mind, even when I don't understand why they are stressed. This does have downsides. Many people, especially in professional contexts, mistake my stress free and easygoing nature as laziness. I also have relatively low empathy, though I'm not sure if that's a side effect, cause, or completely unrelated.
- ekr 7y ago
  I've studied the area of developmental psychology a lot, and all evidence points to neuroticism, anxiety being not genetic but a result of developmental trauma. Adverse childhood experiences, missatunemenmet with the primary caregiver leads to an area of the brain responsible with affect regulation not being developed properly. Infants learn to regulate affect from parents (the mother or the primary caregiver).
77pt77 7y ago
Another case of reverse causation.

zozbot234 7y ago

I thought that the way "introspection" is supposed to work was as a way of asking oneself: "wait, why am I feeling this emotion in the first place? Where does it bottom out, so to say?" Because that in turn tells you what strings to pull at in order to "resolve" the emotion in a comprehensive way. While this cannot be done without regarding the emotion as at least putatively "correct", I'd say that it's far from incompatible with a Stoicism-inspired approach, properly understood.

josinalvo 7y ago
I think you need to understand the origins of the emotion, but you can (after understanding it) see it as mistaken. Say you are pissed because you did not finish a job, but your job performance is increasingly better. Your emotion is not guiding you anywhere useful. It can be useful to understand dispassionately, and then choose to endorse it (that is, this seems a feeling that points to a correct direction, I will thing about solutions) or not (that is, this seems a feeling that does not point to where I want to go, thank you for your message, but I would rather not act on it). Sometimes feelings are mistakes, like a optical illusion. Sometimes they are not.

BeetleB 7y ago

>I find that the healthiest people in my life don't seem to be the types prone to endless rumination. Rumination is unhealthy. And believe it or not, one of the antidotes to it is being able to communicate ones feelings effectively. In my experience, more expressive people tend not to suffer ruminating thoughts.