Out of all the experiences we carry, our journey with Emotions is the oldest. Emotions have been with us since birth and we all have our understanding and Individual theory about what they are, how they work, how to make the best of them, etc. The simple way Emotions can be defined is representation of satisfied or unsatisfied Needs. When you Desire something and achieve more than expected, you experience positive Emotions like joy, happiness, delight, etc. and in the event of not achieving what is Desired, you experience negative Emotions like sadness, anger, frustration, etc.
The entire essence of Emotions is based on Desire and our Individual theories on how to achieve what is Desired. We have spent significant amount of time, in sections above, understanding role of Desire and Individual theories, also how to master them. Before we go ahead, to build a platform for better understanding of what follows, I would recommend the reader to complete this exercise. Reflect on your past experience and fill the columns:
While you list your personal experiences here, what is clearly observed is further away your achievement is from expectation, stronger is the emotion. When we get exactly what you expected or say predicted, you do not experience strong emotions. Instances where your achievement is far exceeding projections, you feel overjoyed; whereas instances where your achievement is far lesser than what you predicted, you feel depressed.
So now you are actually relating your experiences and your Emotions!!!... Good job!
Let’s continue…
Does this also mean that people, who constantly achieve exactly what they predicted, do not feel extreme Emotions? Yes it does. Emotions are Metric System to determine how realistic Individual theory is. Predicting an outcome is driven by your Know-How of the world. How accurately you understand all the forces at work, parameters involved in influencing an act, etc. More realistic your Individual theory is, better is your prediction of outcome. Think of instances when you had put in lot of efforts and were really really really hopeful that things turn out the way you want. You did not have clarity in predicting the outcome accurately, but when it happened the way you hoped for, you were not only extremely happy, but you also added learning from your experience and improved your Know-How about how things work making it more realistic. On the contrary, you did not feel any extreme Emotion when you took the same train which you do daily. The outcome of your efforts was predictable with high accuracy, hence, no extreme Emotion.
It is essential to understand predicting outcome accurately does not necessarily imply being in control. You may not be in control, but you may still be able to predict the outcome accurately. Inner Peace is achieved when your predictions are constantly achieved accurately, when there is not much variation in Emotions. Many experience such Inner Peace occasionally or as peak experiences once-in-a-while.