I wish I had read this before writing the newsletter I just published; I would have included an excerpt I'm so compelled by it: "'Well, you and I are both committed to letting all of life affect us that way.' [. . .] Finally they said, 'The difference is… that feeling? I care about whether it is real or not.'” I think what moves me during this phase of heartbreak within a relationship is the nuance and almost imperceptible but monumental difference they are saying to you. I think about my own partner. I think of that feeling of nakedness in the wake of finally understanding such a difference. The feeling of truth above your head. Something about this essay is something I need to hear. I'm grabbing hold onto some larger truth, and those little differences are showing me some larger picture of myself and who I am to others, not just my partner. Thank you, Michelle, as always.
Sending love to you Lor! I have been behind on reading your essays and I can't wait to re-immerse myself and feel what you have been feeling. It sounds like a tough period. You say it so well: "the nuance and almost imperceptible but monumental difference they are saying to you." Yes. Yes. Yes.
At the time that my ex said this to me, it both seemed like an impossibly small thing to nitpick and also rather enormous. In a way they were saying, "At at epistemological level, we orient to the world in completely different ways. We have never, and will never, inhabit the same reality because of that." Never mind the more prosaic reasons relationships end -- at the time, this made me feel like our entire connection had been a kind of illusion, like what Leibniz says God is always doing, moving things so that they appear to have cause and effect (the golf club doesn't HIT the ball; God moves the club and then the ball).
Anyway I will connect with your heart soon, I know, through your writing. I'm glad this piece spoke to you.
Ok so this video is either wildly funny or inappropriate but.. when you wrote "I found that the presence of raw emotion itself sometimes turned people off, as though they were encountering an allergen that they took great care — at all other times, in all other places — to avoid" this video instantly popped into my mind, with these people as the lead singer in the video:
Okay, I normally find it difficult to make time to watch videos other people send me (at the times they send them particularly), but this just made my entire morning and I'm sharing it immediately 😭👌
Michelle, I think your feelings DO make you special. Yes, they make you special when, as you say, you relate to them with "a gentle harness" & use them not as descriptions but sensors.
But I think also just the the sheer biggness of your feelings is a precious gift -- even before it's put to work or harnessed.
That said, I get what you mean: "special" used in your essay really means "used deeply & well."
It's especially fascinating for me to hear your story of finding a balanced relationship to feeling: I feel mine began from the opposite extreme. Even when I prided myself in understanding other's emotions as a university student, I viewed my own emotions with the full resolution of "good", "bad", or "stressed" (just ask Eleanor 😭 ). Especially as they become more intense.
I think this came in large part from the fear that, if I acknowledge the messy complexity of my own feelings, they'd overwhelm me & make my worst fears true.
"Acknowledging that you're conflicted & unfulfilled? Oops now it turns out you life IS fundamentally conflicting & unfulfilling! And you're too emotionally overwhelmed to do anything to change it! Should have just smiled & been positive, bucko!" (this of course never actually happened)
In comparison (but without putting a value judgement of any sort), you entering life with such BIG emotions, paying attention to them, & seeking ways to express them, is starkly different from so many people. Different & important.
I think "I can ride them almost anywhere. And yes, their noses are good" is the understatement of the year -- your emotional sensitivity is incredible, & I feel it in everything you do, from research to writing to how you express yourself. It's rare, & you've already done so much important work with it.
___
I also just want to say: my body viscerally recoiled hearing the line about "it is best to keep some things under the surface" (even though I'd heard this story the day it happened, actually). Wow, that feels like a skilled fighter slicing an opponent's vein with precision, knowing they'll bleed slowly but fatally. I agree: I can't think of a worse thing someone could have said at that moment! :((((( Props to you for recovering & making your art!
I think our society is rotting with things kept under the surface -- your performance art isn't a shame, but needed medicine!
This is probably not my place to say anything but... I wonder if there's another way to see your social role as a Chinese woman: not that you are failing what's expected of you, but that you are *living* what is deeply needed, & often missing.
Michelle, may your feelings be ever expansive & bright <3
This is such a sweet and loving and thoughtful response to the essay, David, thank you. I think I've definitely struggled with how *long* it's taken me to get to a productive-feeling place with my emotions. I've second-guessed myself so many times because if *this* was the answer all along, why did it take me literally years and years and years? But, it all depends on what scale you use to evaluate growth, I suppose :-)
I think it's VERY normal, perhaps even extraordinarily common, to sort our emotions and to avoid the ones we label as "bad." Buddhism sort of emerges out of this human tendency, right, as a systemic, spiritual, RELIGIOUS answer to this. The fact that meditation and unhooking ourselves from our labels -- the fact that this is still RELEVANT! -- is interesting in an of itself. I think it's pretty automatic for most people, myself included, to operate as though some emotions are good and others are bad. (I also think that culture plays a huge role: how do OTHER people react to our big emotions? Even if we once thought they were normal, the story changes once a loved one is put off.)
Thanks for your words about my social role as a Chinese woman. I hope so. I think regardless of what story I try to tell about it, the truth (?) is that I just *am* a Chinese-Canadian woman, insofar as any statements about identity are *truthful*, and I also *do* have this relationship with my emotions, with disclosure, and with art. The world is going to have to deal with that, and for the most part, people have received it very well, and I've been lucky :-)
I like your connection to a meditative / Buddhist approach to emotions, & how it addresses both extremes of over-identification & suppression. When I observe my emotions non-judgmentally, you're right, I can both avoid letting them run my life, and also not label them as bad and needing to be avoided :)
I wish I had read this before writing the newsletter I just published; I would have included an excerpt I'm so compelled by it: "'Well, you and I are both committed to letting all of life affect us that way.' [. . .] Finally they said, 'The difference is… that feeling? I care about whether it is real or not.'” I think what moves me during this phase of heartbreak within a relationship is the nuance and almost imperceptible but monumental difference they are saying to you. I think about my own partner. I think of that feeling of nakedness in the wake of finally understanding such a difference. The feeling of truth above your head. Something about this essay is something I need to hear. I'm grabbing hold onto some larger truth, and those little differences are showing me some larger picture of myself and who I am to others, not just my partner. Thank you, Michelle, as always.
Sending love to you Lor! I have been behind on reading your essays and I can't wait to re-immerse myself and feel what you have been feeling. It sounds like a tough period. You say it so well: "the nuance and almost imperceptible but monumental difference they are saying to you." Yes. Yes. Yes.
At the time that my ex said this to me, it both seemed like an impossibly small thing to nitpick and also rather enormous. In a way they were saying, "At at epistemological level, we orient to the world in completely different ways. We have never, and will never, inhabit the same reality because of that." Never mind the more prosaic reasons relationships end -- at the time, this made me feel like our entire connection had been a kind of illusion, like what Leibniz says God is always doing, moving things so that they appear to have cause and effect (the golf club doesn't HIT the ball; God moves the club and then the ball).
Anyway I will connect with your heart soon, I know, through your writing. I'm glad this piece spoke to you.
Ok so this video is either wildly funny or inappropriate but.. when you wrote "I found that the presence of raw emotion itself sometimes turned people off, as though they were encountering an allergen that they took great care — at all other times, in all other places — to avoid" this video instantly popped into my mind, with these people as the lead singer in the video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uiH9GTkcWNI
Okay, I normally find it difficult to make time to watch videos other people send me (at the times they send them particularly), but this just made my entire morning and I'm sharing it immediately 😭👌
Michelle, I think your feelings DO make you special. Yes, they make you special when, as you say, you relate to them with "a gentle harness" & use them not as descriptions but sensors.
But I think also just the the sheer biggness of your feelings is a precious gift -- even before it's put to work or harnessed.
That said, I get what you mean: "special" used in your essay really means "used deeply & well."
It's especially fascinating for me to hear your story of finding a balanced relationship to feeling: I feel mine began from the opposite extreme. Even when I prided myself in understanding other's emotions as a university student, I viewed my own emotions with the full resolution of "good", "bad", or "stressed" (just ask Eleanor 😭 ). Especially as they become more intense.
I think this came in large part from the fear that, if I acknowledge the messy complexity of my own feelings, they'd overwhelm me & make my worst fears true.
"Acknowledging that you're conflicted & unfulfilled? Oops now it turns out you life IS fundamentally conflicting & unfulfilling! And you're too emotionally overwhelmed to do anything to change it! Should have just smiled & been positive, bucko!" (this of course never actually happened)
In comparison (but without putting a value judgement of any sort), you entering life with such BIG emotions, paying attention to them, & seeking ways to express them, is starkly different from so many people. Different & important.
I think "I can ride them almost anywhere. And yes, their noses are good" is the understatement of the year -- your emotional sensitivity is incredible, & I feel it in everything you do, from research to writing to how you express yourself. It's rare, & you've already done so much important work with it.
___
I also just want to say: my body viscerally recoiled hearing the line about "it is best to keep some things under the surface" (even though I'd heard this story the day it happened, actually). Wow, that feels like a skilled fighter slicing an opponent's vein with precision, knowing they'll bleed slowly but fatally. I agree: I can't think of a worse thing someone could have said at that moment! :((((( Props to you for recovering & making your art!
I think our society is rotting with things kept under the surface -- your performance art isn't a shame, but needed medicine!
This is probably not my place to say anything but... I wonder if there's another way to see your social role as a Chinese woman: not that you are failing what's expected of you, but that you are *living* what is deeply needed, & often missing.
Michelle, may your feelings be ever expansive & bright <3
This is such a sweet and loving and thoughtful response to the essay, David, thank you. I think I've definitely struggled with how *long* it's taken me to get to a productive-feeling place with my emotions. I've second-guessed myself so many times because if *this* was the answer all along, why did it take me literally years and years and years? But, it all depends on what scale you use to evaluate growth, I suppose :-)
I think it's VERY normal, perhaps even extraordinarily common, to sort our emotions and to avoid the ones we label as "bad." Buddhism sort of emerges out of this human tendency, right, as a systemic, spiritual, RELIGIOUS answer to this. The fact that meditation and unhooking ourselves from our labels -- the fact that this is still RELEVANT! -- is interesting in an of itself. I think it's pretty automatic for most people, myself included, to operate as though some emotions are good and others are bad. (I also think that culture plays a huge role: how do OTHER people react to our big emotions? Even if we once thought they were normal, the story changes once a loved one is put off.)
Thanks for your words about my social role as a Chinese woman. I hope so. I think regardless of what story I try to tell about it, the truth (?) is that I just *am* a Chinese-Canadian woman, insofar as any statements about identity are *truthful*, and I also *do* have this relationship with my emotions, with disclosure, and with art. The world is going to have to deal with that, and for the most part, people have received it very well, and I've been lucky :-)
I like your connection to a meditative / Buddhist approach to emotions, & how it addresses both extremes of over-identification & suppression. When I observe my emotions non-judgmentally, you're right, I can both avoid letting them run my life, and also not label them as bad and needing to be avoided :)