On Releasing One’s Anger Through the Employment of Self-Recognition

A discussion of emotions and passions will lead to the importance for an individual’s control to lie in their rationale. Then, a look into a specific passion, anger, will expose an argument for what extirpates the emotions and passion’s control over the individual altogether. The look into anger will also show how one preserves control to lie wholly in their rationale.

The stoics want to disregard all emotions and passions because they want to live according to their god-given reason: they want to live according to nature. Living according to reason for the Stoic meant that the individual’s mind functions to direct him towards virtuous choices, which, in turn, ultimately leads him to tranquility and a further state of Eudaimonia. Now, the reason for why the Stoics wanted the individual to deny all emotions and passions is because these arise in the individual from certain value judgments and beliefs that stem from opinion as opposed to knowledge, and are not subject to reason’s control. The emotions, to some degrees, existed in line (parallel) to an individual’s more powerful reason, but the Stoics wanted them gone so they never had a chance to evolve into uncontrollable passions that which carry one beyond the dictates/confines of reason. Zeno of Citium claimed that the emotions are actually deliberate rejections of reason; moreover, they are conscious disobedience of reason. Seneca even went on to say that extreme emotions such as Anger are unnatural to the human’s nature, assenting to the idea that they are inherently destructive in nature. In fact, when emotions become uncontrollable passions they supercede one’s reason in a way that leads them into a certain momentum and inertia they cannot stop in which they are unable to place focus on anything else but their passion. Furthermore, they become passionate about something outward and external to them, barring them from internal rationality, since their focus is in the wrong place. At first, passions can almost seem advantageous in that one may gain momentum in an area they deem as necessary for happiness; however, they are absolutely disadvantageous because they produce unhealthy, excessive, and irrational “longing” in individuals; further, “it is an ungoverned reaching, not subject to reason, toward some great good that is anticipated” (Cicero, T.D. 3.24, p. 134). This ‘anticipation’ seems equated to ‘expectation’ and with expectation one can never be content, thus limiting the individual from having clear judgment, thus putting them in a state far from tranquility. If one never possesses expectations about what they value as ‘good,’ they can never be disappointed if they do not achieve it. If one just does what is necessary and adapts himself to his situation, he will be content like that of the mouse, since he is not ‘longing’ for anything more (Diogenes Laertius, p. 110: 6.20-81).

Now, the Stoics say that in order for one to control their own rationale, they must disregard their emotions; however, it appears to me that it is more important for individuals to acknowledge that their emotions (as value judgments) affect their rationality; this way individuals have a better understanding of themselves, and are then able to control their emotions using their rationale. In this way, if people are aware that their emotions have an effect on their rationality, they can be aware when their feelings are affecting their reasoning, thus allowing for them to check their own emotions and gain control with their own rationale; this would, in turn, prevent irrational passion from gaining momentum and overpowering their rationale. If individuals are self-aware, self-conscious, able to self-recognize, and learn to not rely on external support, they will be closer to a state of self-sufficiency and self-control.

Next, let us observe a specific passion, anger, and its effect on an individual’s rationale. It seems to me that when one gets angry they place the blame for what angers them on other things, objects, people, etc. and intend to harm those who are within their [outward] vision. A child falls, he pounds the ground. A surfer falls, he pounds the water or his surfboard. What both the child and the surfer share in common, is a lack of introspection, to a point where they do not realize they are angry with themselves. It appears that the murderer intends harm on what is in his [external] vision because he cannot inwardly view himself and see it is he that should receive the harm. Perhaps the murderer wants to be murdered (or heavily punished). The murderer is actually angry with himself and intends to punish himself, but since he himself is not in his [external] range of vision, he harms those who are. Thus, once he himself is murdered, he is at last at bliss and is therapeutically healed by receiving the recognition he desired. Seneca claims that the best therapy for a murderer is their execution, in that they have “long since… been seeking to die in [their] wretchedness” and the way to free them from their insanity is to “wholly immerse [them] in the torments” they “have caused others to suffer” (On Anger p.155: 16.3).

On to a further point, those who react to passionate anger by harming those lying in their external vision, lack the introspective power that would allow them to recognize where their desire to intend harm is directed (or where the desire actually stems from). The individual becomes enslaved by anger (this passion) in a way that binds him to act irrationally. From this point, the enslaved individual is in the control of the overpowering emotion; thus, his rationale is out of control, so he inflicts control over those he feels he can control, so as to illude his conscious rationale into feeling as if it is what is in control. Tones of Hegel’s Master-Slave Dialectic drive home this thought, where the master exerts control over what he feels he can control (the slave), thus illuding himself into thinking he (the master) is in control, only to actually become dependent on the slave. On the other hand, the slave actually becomes free in this sense, since he is living rather stoically, and self-reflectively realizes he is independent, in light of the master’s dependence on him. The act of self-reflectivity here helps the individual come to understand that they are responsible for themselves, releasing them from the out-of-control feeling, and letting them escape the irrational urge to control others. Once they can escape the urge to control others, they can escape the bonds of emotion through the same self-reflectivity (they are able to realize that they themselves need to control their own emotions, stoically, in order to free their rationale). They will, in turn, redirect their external vision inward, and, with this new power of introspection, understand they are angry with themselves; but, instead of inflicting harm on what is in their internal vision (like how they would react to what is in their external vision) the anger will dissolve through this self-recognition.

Furthermore, self-awareness is a crucial component for self-reflectivity to help an individual, for they must be able to notice exactly what it is they are internally feeling in order to have a successful activation of self-recognition. Knowledge of one’s own mental states allows the individual to recognize their current state of mind for what it is and then be able to release it for reason/rationality to work unobstructed. The self-recognition then works as a sort of inward pacification by explicating the emotion to himself (or through one’s self, inwardly externalizing), in way that releases the individual from the emotion, because he internalizes the anger rather than outwardly externalizing the anger (where, in the former, the internalization of the anger or emotion allows him to become independent of any Other; where the latter, the externalization of emotions and passions makes him dependent on an Other present being for him to release the emotion). The internalization and self-recognition of one’s emotion (rather than the outward externalization [projecting] of the emotion) allows one to acutely control the emotion, so to keep the rationale free and from acting outwardly in response to the emotion.

Now, I’d like to focus more on why self-recognition of the emotions works as an internalizing force, and why it works to free and release these emotions and passions from one’s self, further granting one self-control and rational control (eliminating the urge or impulse to control others). First, it is utterly imperative to remember that according to some influential Stoics like Chrysippus and Epictetus, passions are uninhibited emotions, stemmed from beliefs and value judgments. Epictetus recognizes this by questioning “if, then, an impression has caused Menelaus to feel that it was an advantage to be robbed of such a wife, what would have happened?” (The Discourses, p.63, Ch. 28; 13). From this question, it goes to show that Epictetus felt passionate reactions to events are based on the values one attaches/attributes to certain sorts of happenings, e.g. a man losing his wife to another man. It seems that Epictetus is suggesting that had Menelaus possessed a different interpretation of what happened, the course of history would have been dramatically different. This is important in acknowledging that Menelaus let himself be slave to his emotions and value judgments, instead of reasoning that he was in some way better off losing ‘such a wife.’ It appears that had Menelaus reflected introspectively he would have sublimated his anger or passion and released it healthily; on the contrary, his reaction to the value judgment he placed on being “robbed of such a wife,” led to an uncontrollable passion and led him to intend harm on Paris (the ‘robber’), and, in turn, leading to “wars and seditions, the deaths of many,” (p. 63: 28; 14). So, when one performs acts of self-recognition and introspection, they are able to inquire into their mental state, figure out the root of their feelings or emotions and examine the value-judgment/belief behind why they are moved to feel that certain way. This allows them to realize or come to an understanding about their value judgment and, in this way, are able to control their behavior or their reaction; and, since they are reasoning through all of this, it is their rationale in control and the activity (self-recognition) is what releases/frees them from the enslaving emotions. So, an enslaved individual is assuming control over others in a way that makes him dependent on them and lacks any notion of ‘being-for-self.’

My overarching claim is that, in light of our modern-day psychological term ‘projection’ and recognizing Hegel’s views about individual’s need for recognition (acknowledgement), the reason for why certain punishments “rid [criminals] of that insanity,” is because they are eventually receiving the recognition for the punishment they actually desire; and, since they lack the power of introspection and self-recognition, they are never able to heal inwardly; rather, they project their desires outwardly on those within their external vision. Using the example of the murderer receiving therapeutic bliss through his execution, it is once he is “wholly immersed in the torments that [he] suffered and caused others to suffer,” he is acknowledged (or recognized) for what he desires, and for what he has irrationally projected onto those within his scope of control (On Anger, p. 155: 16.3). It is apparent that because the murderer lacks the power of introspection and control over his own rationale (allowing his reason to succumb to the passions of anger), he seeks to exert control over others, so as to illude himself the feeling of being in control; furthermore, he seeks control over those in his external vision, instead of seeking control over himself. These thoughts tie into my theory for why people smoke cigarettes: they are out-of-control of their death, and since smoking cigarettes is harmful and destructive to themselves, they can feel in control over their own demise. From this notion I notice that, in light of our modern age knowledge and with all the evidence we have of the destructive effects of booze and tobacco, people continue to drink alcohol and smoke cigarettes perhaps to feel somewhat in control of themselves and their own destruction, since they feel that their life, and especially their death, is so far out of their control.

References

Cicero. Tusculan Disputations 3.24. Phil-118 Course Reader. Santa Cruz. 2013.

Gill, Christopher, and Robin Hard. The discourses of Epictetus. London: Everyman, 1995.

Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich, Arnold V. Miller, and J. N. Findlay. Phenomenology of spirit. Oxford [England: Clarendon Press, 1977.

Laertius, Diogenes. 6.20-81. Phil-118 Course Reader. Santa Cruz. 2013.

Seneca. On Anger. Phil-118 Course Reader. Santa Cruz. 2013.