My furniture and my brain

The walls of my apartment are blank by choice, but it might be a mistake. Surrounding yourself with photographs of happy experiences is a very important therapy. I suggest this because the scientific research found in the book The Emotional Life of Your Brain compels it. The authors suggest that meditating on happy and peaceful memories is as effective physically on the brain as physical exercise is on the muscles.

The furniture in my apartment is cheap but acceptably functional. It would be more expensive to move my furniture than it would cost to buy new furniture in my next home should I choose to move. I know people who take their furniture very seriously and invest heavily in antiques or high-quality pieces. I assume they are thinking of their furniture as an investment that eventually will cover the costs of settling their estates or serve to settle a small portion of debt in an emergency.

But people hang on to the strangest things, and even spend much more money than those items are worth to preserve or transport them. You could save money by owning a truck large enough to move your own furniture, but considering the cost of the fuel alone, the actual value of the investment plummets rapidly into the red.

For some people cost is not even a consideration. Words such as "nostalgia" and "sentimental" come into play. People hoard things perhaps for the emotional intensity of the memories evoked by those things, fear of reprisal for having discarded them, an aching notion that the thing will be needed almost as soon as it is discarded, or the sense that it might gain in value over time instead of lose value. I can remember some instances when I needed something after I discarded it. My great aunts had trunks filled with old processed bank checks dating back fifty years or more.

Except for money, the weight or degree of certain values we attach to things are different for everyone. I have a few different values besides memory triggers.

Distraction value: I need things to distract me from other emotions that take over in the absence of external stimuli. The emotions kept at bay by the distractions are driven by my chronic anxiety. The word "dour" is the best word that comes to mind. An overly criticizing shadowy behemoth pointing and insulting me with relentless memories of negative experiences. I don't need a relationship for that, it's built-in.

Social Attraction value: Can I use the thing to break the ice or invite favorable curiosity and create social activity? On some occasions while taking photographs I appear to others as a professional and they ask me to use their camera to take pictures of them. It's a nice experience but never goes beyond that because they are socially engaged with others. Social media so far has been my only solace. Sharing and commenting on social media gives me a small sense of validation when someone comments or favorably votes on my posts. 

I assign utilitarian value to things rather than sentimental value, unless it's a gift, which I call "etiquette judgement traps," another of my inherent distortions. To gifts I assign competitive values such as the ability to match the value and uniqueness of a gift in return, the ability to appear completely fair in situations where gifts are exchanged by multiple people. The stress can make one give up entirely on gift-related holidays. Church is bad enough brimming with vindictive judgemental competitors in the games of proper attire, ritual performance, and financial "sacrifices." Some of the scowls of disapproval at my inability to carry a tune while singing hymns in church were evidence enough for me to abandon those dens of gossip and religio-political intrigue. Christmas? No thanks.

Interestingly, the value of things you can't take with you change when you move across the country, and it changes how you feel about similar things in the future. I had a very expensive black leather high-backed swivel chair fit for a Supreme Court Justice, the kind with brass studs decorating the trim. It emitted an aura of intimidation and authority that impressed people on many occasions. I had to leave it behind and sometimes I miss it, but mostly I wonder what on earth I was thinking when I bought the thing back in 1995.

After moving twice and taking the furniture with me, I don't think I want to do that again, ever. I'll happily give my furniture to the NW Furniture Bank.

The trick of life

After isolating myself for such a long time I began to realize that nobody else has anything to do with the way I feel. I always thought I was disliked by everyone and I cherry-picked every little detail about what other people did so I could rationalize my illusions about how other people felt about me.

My complaints and inappropriate reactions to what other people did were all based on the illusion that external events were the cause of my feelings. So what is the real cause? Just my natural brain chemistry, imbalanced, creating a permanent state of hopelessness with rare bouts of normal, whatever that is.

This is true for everyone. Our perceptions of events and people are colored by the present balance of brain chemistry and brain physiology determined primarily by our genetics. Beyond our genetics, our Neurological Makeup was influenced by outside things like chemicals or radiation, malnutrition and stress on one or both parents.

Evolution dictates that our genes were influenced by the environment of our parents and their parents too, all the way back to the beginning.

We all see the same basic colors, but knowing that some people are color-blind tells me that none of us may see the exact same shade of any color.

Think about the way other people look at you? You are responsible for how you feel. Apparently some authority figures have yet to grasp the concept that emotions are a personal responsibility, such as the incident that occurred in Florida: 14-year-old-tackled-choked-giving-police-dehumanizing-stare . The only dehumanizing was in the mind of the officer.

Reading Semiotics

As someone who has great difficulty connecting with people I think about it all the time. I have an undergraduate degree in Communication, spanning both mass media technology and professional interpersonal communication. Learning about it may improve my ability to go through the motions, but that's about it. It's not going to significantly change my brain chemistry to alleviate my chronic anxiety.

 I'm fascinated by human perception and behavior. Working on one of my COM papers led me to discover Semiotics, the study of signs and symbols and their use or interpretation. I'm reading Semiotics: The Basics by Daniel Chandler. A good companion would be something on Operant Conditioning and memory.

One day in the college cafeteria I overheard a group of students making fun of someone they knew but who was not present. Having a long history of being the subject of such gossip I have experience observing changes in the behavior of people who associate directly and even indirectly with the instigators of humor at the expense of someone else and the expense of myself.

Specifically, subordinates in a group who wish to show their loyalty to the leader will adopt the attitude of the leader toward a target (someone). Some members on the perimeter of the group will outwardly laugh at the leader's joke about the target, but find themselves harboring feelings of guilt for doing so. When they see the target every day, the memory of the joke with all its emotional baggage resurfaces. Their behavior changes significantly toward that person. They keep their distance, avoid eye contact or avoid the same areas or activities.

After a significant passage of time, the original joke may have been forgotten, but the emotional baggage is reinforced. After the memory of the initial event has faded, the remaining emotions that are triggered by the sight of the target must be rationalized. Some new reason must be created to explain why they feel the way they do about the target.

I call it Causal Drift. It's probably called something else, but the idea stems from how memory operates.

I assume couples break up over it. Someone says something hurtful but the other person lets it slide without saying expressing how they feel about what was said, the incident is forgotten, but the emotion is still there, and they accumulate.

It's not like this for everyone. A few lucky people can remember every detail and easily compartmentalize their emotions, but many people do not and are vulnerable to manipulation by cult-leaders, politicians and the mass media.

They are the ones who wind up voting against their own interests, developing paranoia-fueled conspiracy theories, or foaming at the mouth as they gyrate wildly, kicking over folding chairs at political town hall meetings.