Taking Pleasure from Troubles

Is exaggerating problems another form of hiding behind irresponsibility? Does a behavior under the name of sensitivity actually represent insensitivity?

People can suddenly turn into the world’s most delicate, most sensitive, and most responsible person in the face of an adverse event, but this is as transient as a flash in the pan and soon over.

The result of evaluating events based on our feelings is something we do almost all through our lives. We attribute seemingly positive meanings to occurrences and perceive them as reality! If we are really so good, tender, sensitive, loving, and open-hearted, why do we not reflect these attributes during less eventful times? Whenever an adverse event or a negative situation occurs, we become very sensitive all of a sudden. We’re constantly shifting between two emotional extremes! In other words, we’re either very positive or very negative.

I will continue by hoping that what I express here is not considered superficially on the basis of my words but also with the depth of the subject. Our elders tell us that the more we become sad in the face of an adversity, the more sensitive and better we will become. That is a delusion, but a delusion is not always an illusion. You’re confused, right?

Let me just clarify something. It denotes the “wrongs” you believe to be correct, no matter how “wrong” they actually are. To you they are right. Just like you believe in the concept of “love”! You think that love glorifies and feeds you, but you cannot understand that it actually directs you to the outside world and makes you increasingly dependent. As a matter of fact, there is no such thing as love and hate. We create these concepts ourselves. There is also no such thing as bitter or sweet. These are created when we look at something and want to make a separation. This is exactly when a “delusion” is created.

The main source of thought, which is connected to emotion, is the quest of the senses for balance. The senses face adversities and encounter one external stimulus and one internal stimulus, and they are triggered. We, as part of our worldly nature, tend to react against anything that threatens our very existence. We sometimes act by thinking that we have the opportunity to experience a situation similar to that of someone who also faced an adverse event. As it happens, this is not a bad thing, but the subtle approach is that we must not experience such events. The “Ego” considers events not as they actually are but in the way it wants them to happen. However, there may be things beyond us from time to time. It is almost impossible to show people how they miss things if they overlook this distinction, because they’re already under the effect of a “delusion.”

You may feel angry at me, and I can understand this. The ideas I am explaining to you go contrary to everything you’ve learned. I wholeheartedly believe we will meet somewhere if you bear with me and try to understand what I’m saying. Life has taught to me to be angry with myself rather than become frustrated with others. I now invite you to a place outside events and words. This is about seeing the whole picture instead of getting bogged down in the details. For example, let’s think about what people feel about the coal miners who died in the fire in the Soma mines recently. Everyone is trying to prove he or she is more emotional and sensitive than the next.

The comments posted on Facebook and the images shared all aim to say, “I am way more distressed than you!” This also applies to our top officials. But the damage is done now. What’s more important is what we did before the deadly incident. What did we do to prevent it from happening? What precautions did we take? What should be done now? Now then, where is all that sensitivity, love, goodness, consciousness, and awareness that we constantly emphasize? When did we forget them?

How can someone who cannot even use his own mind give suggestions to others? How can someone who cannot guide himself show the way to others?

Our ancestors said, “Even if you know a lot, also ask someone else who knows.” We think we always know best, and we get angry when we do not agree with something. When we are full of a little love, we can begin to hate all of a sudden. We can treat a person like royalty or trample over the same person. This is how we create the concepts of good and bad.

We simply take pleasure from trouble. Humans tend to feed on negative energy due to their nature, because terrestrial energy is also negative. We move within the field of this terrestrial energy. We unwittingly feed off this terrestrial energy, because our connection with it is natural. We actually pity ourselves when pitying others. One day, people saw Thomas Hobbes giving money to a roadside beggar. When asked about the reason for his generosity, he said, “I didn’t do it to help him. I just did it to eliminate the sorrow I felt because he was so poor.” The philosopher George Santayana also said, “Even if there are such generous and protective drives in human nature, they are usually weak and temporary. If you dig beneath the surface, you will find an aggressive, stubborn, and extremely selfish person.”

We act as if we have good faith while using concepts such as love, care, kindness, goodness, tenderness, and forgiveness, but this is not enough to make us good human beings.

If we had shown more sensitivity before the accident in Soma, none of us would have seen those consequences. Sensitivity should therefore cover our entire lives. We should always, under any circumstances, be good. To develop this perspective, internalizing and naturalizing is a very important state of consciousness. When evaluating events, we have to see things not from ourselves but from the perspective of the other person and act according to what is needed. Only like this can we learn empathy and preserve the peace, security, and respect we deserve.

*The word empathy here is not used in the sense of imagining yourself in someone else’s shoes, but I will discuss this in detail in another article.