Now I live with my parents. They always turn on the television and have meals. When watching television content that appeals to our emotions, I realized why we get mentally tired of these emotional shows. Let’s talk about it.
How to stop emotional fatigue
Sometimes, we want to stop emotional fatigue. Continuing to feel emotions exhausts us, especially if we have intense empathy.
If we have an empathic nature, we cannot avoid feeling others’ emotions. Although it may be no problem if it is someone else’s happiness, negative emotions make us feel down.
That often makes us avoid emotional content.
One typical example is TV programs.
I cannot always enjoy TV programs because they overly stimulate my empathy. For example, the news continuously reports on tragic events. Political debate programs are filled with anger and claims. Even advertisements appeal to their products with emotional short stories, including fear of risk and anxieties about the future. That often exhausted my mind.
Recently, I realized that those emotional contents don’t cause our mental suffering. The true cause was their irrationality. This awareness might free you from your mental exhaustion. Today, I will explain why.
Irrationality of a TV program
Irrationality, not empathy, creates our emotional exhaustion.
In other words, we are misunderstanding the cause of mental fatigue. Avoiding negative emotions doesn’t improve our mental state. Instead, realize their unreasonableness. That frees you from emotional exhaustion.
For example, during yesterday’s dinner, my parents had the TV on. It was a TV program that criticized scammers for their inhumanity. It is intended to incite the viewer’s anger at scammers and their organizations. It was as if the victim was an honest and innocent citizen, while the scammers were like a pest.
However, logically speaking, scammers are also humans, not bugs and insects.
From the perspective of those who deceive others, it is a survival strategy. They were not able to live in the same way as their surroundings. Their circumstances and continuous rational judgment led them to their current situation. It is unreasonable to define them as non-human.
In other words, those two forces are in a struggle for power and authority. A TV program belongs to the force of the state. On the other hand, scammer organizations are independent entities that attempt to establish different governance and laws within the state.
That big picture provides us with a moderate understanding of the TV programs. They are on one side of social forces that are striving to enhance their power and authority. That means that both the state and scammer organizations are the same in terms of pursuing their power for domination.
Examples of irrational claims
The same goes for wars, political claims, and advertisements.
Not only war, but also opposition to war is nothing but a power struggle. They don’t understand the irrationality of claiming abolition of war while eating meals every day. Wheat and rice are living beings like humans. While eating a meal with a smile, they are claiming, “All people must not make any victim lives!” Logically speaking, it is absurd.
A politician said, “If we leave the national politics to these parties, this country will be ruined!” Although other civilians chose the opposing political party to thrive, he describes his ideas as if they are absolute. Although that is not democracy but dictatorship, many supporters appraise it as democracy.
An advertisement stated, “Her faded skin made her look shabby, but this skincare cream made her bright, so we want to share this happiness with everyone.” Although there is another form of happiness in displaying one’s age well, they assume that youth is absolute happiness.
They don’t make sense. That confuses our values.
For logical people, the lack of logical consistency traps us in a loop of thought. A broader perspective calms us. In other words, negative emotions in these claims don’t exhaust us.
In my case, I have come to recognize that all the news and ads on TV are power struggles. They are battles between societies and values. They only care about their own power. They cannot justify their behaviors logically, so they impress their assertions emotionally.
That awareness freed me from the stress of watching negative information. There is no particular form of justice and happiness. They are just irrational. We don’t have to take them seriously.
Conclusion
That is why irrationality, not empathy, creates our emotional suffering.
They are on one side of social forces that are striving to enhance their power and authority. We don’t have to take it seriously.
This awareness might free you from your mental exhaustion.
Thank you for reading this article. I hope to see you in the next one.
