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Comment by mongol | Hacker News Reader

Last weekend I had a negative realization. Nothing major, just some bad personal news, something that basically was broken and required possible expensive repairs. I immediately got in a negative mood, it was visceral but it had also a physical effect on me. I only wanted to sleep, lost all energy, just wanted to handle the negative news which was only possible on a weekday. At the same time I thought, it is crazy I feel a physical impact because of a thought affecting my mood. I could think rationally about it, but my tiredness and lack of energy did not go away.

During the week, I worked out the cause of the bad news, and this is no longer a problem. But I am somehow concerned that what was basicially a thought could have this impact on me.

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The thought you had is affecting your meta thought about being affected by a negative thought, my friend.

All your body does is process information that passes through the brain and nervous system. Thoughts are just as primary as the senses that reflect something in the outside world. And your negative realisation was interpreted by the rest of your system as an archetypal 'bad situation out of your control'. That's being trapped, which is a very old situation for an animal to be in. Trapped animals look for a way out and if nothing yields they become inactive.

I've found reminding myself of the above helps me take whatever limited control I can of the threat (i.e. writing down and visualising what I'm going to do when I can solve it) and also taking some control of other parts of my life. You can trick your body by sending it soothing signals which are an antidote to the /type/ of situation you are in (if not necessarily actually solve it).

Observing anger can be similarly humbling.

You can get ahead of the rush of cortisol enough to watch it happening and remain lucid / disconnected from it, but that's not enough (at least in my experience so far) to avoid the unpleasant physical sensation.

I abhor the the anger sensation in the body. I am generally in a good relaxed mood and rarely get angry but it does happen when pushed too far. Last time it happened I was observing the sensation and my reaction to the trigger without being able to make it stop. I now believe it’s okay to let it run its course, it’s perhaps better than trying to suppress it. But oh boy, that visceral feeling isn’t pleasant at all, a total mood disrupter.

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