Emotions.

Sometimes I wish I was more in control of my emotions. Today, my professor made me cry. Once I start, there is no stopping me. Annoying. I'll spare you the details, and instead, focus on the interesting phenomenon we call emotions. I wonder; do animals have emotions, or just instincts? I think dogs get sad, and I'm pretty convinced that Dad's little Sweet-Pea gets jealous, but that's merely speculation. I think our emotions are what distinguish us so much from the other things on the planet. Why do we have them? What do they do? What's the use? And why do other people have such control over them and I seem like I have no control over them? I mean, when I think a guy I like may text me, and he never does, I'm disappointed. When a teacher completely belittles me, I get so upset I could kick a puppy. (Well, no, I couldn't...but hopefully you understand the analogy.)


I'm reminded of a C.S. Lewis quote:


To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket — safe, dark, motionless, airless — it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. The alternative to tragedy, or at least to the risk of tragedy, is damnation. The only place outside of Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and perturbations of love is Hell.


While looking for that quote, I came across the one below. Now I may not be in complete agreement with him, but I certainly understand his point.


“Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn't it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up. You build up all these defenses, you build up a whole suit of armor, so that nothing can hurt you, then one stupid person, no different from any other stupid person, wanders into your stupid life...You give them a piece of you. They didn't ask for it. They did something dumb one day, like kiss you or smile at you, and then your life isn't your own anymore. Love takes hostages. It gets inside you. It eats you out and leaves you crying in the darkness, so simple a phrase like 'maybe we should be just friends' turns into a glass splinter working its way into your heart. It hurts. Not just in the imagination. Not just in the mind. It's a soul-hurt, a real gets-inside-you-and-rips-you-apart pain. I hate love.”- Neil Gaiman


I certainly don't hate love, but it resonates, doesn't it?


So, is there a way to not let people have so much control of my emotions? Not care so much what they think? Be more confident in myself? Be more confident in who God made me to be and care what He thinks more than others?  I think we are emotional beings because we are made in the image of God and He Himself is emotional. Probably not in the same overtired or PMSy way that I get, but He has emotions still the same. Interesting. Emotions. Weird. The End for now.