Ethics
Is the sorrow or anger you feel truly yours, or is it a passive emotion imposed from the outside?
📝ONGO's Reflection
I was at a loss when I first faced this book, packed dense with proofs in the geometric manner. But following the process by which Spinoza dissects the emotions, I feel my mind, somehow, grow astonishingly clear. He says the reason we live as slaves to feelings like joy, sorrow, and anger is that we do not know their true causes. The moment we understand the necessary order of things, we can step free of the passive life that is tossed this way and that by outside stimuli. When the waves of emotion would sweep me away, this book becomes a steadfast anchor of reason.
"An emotion, which is a passion, ceases to be a passion, as soon as we form a clear and distinct idea thereof."Baruch Spinoza, Ethics
"감정은 우리가 그것을 명확하고 판명하게 이해하는 순간 수동적인 상태이기를 멈춘다."
🌱Apply It Today
When anger or sadness takes hold, step back and view the emotion objectively: "What external cause set this off?" Simply analyzing the cause with reason eases the pain.
