By Kristina Wilder, M.A.
I recently found myself in a court where a judge was seeing and then sentencing several cases. While in the court room, I noticed how at times the people in the court such as the defendants, lawyers, and people observing the court had emotional reactions to the decisions made by the judge. However, not everyone in the court had the same emotional response to the judgments.
Let me examine that emotional response for a moment. When people feel an emotion or behave in a particular way, it is common to point to an event and say “I feel this way because X happened” or “I did Y because so-and-so did Z.” Such statements reinforce the idea that events (or “a” – activating events) directly cause our emotions and cause us to behave in particular ways (also known as the emotional or behavioral “c” – consequence) .
However, if that was the case that activating events caused our emotional and behavioral consequences, every person in the courtroom would react the same to the event of the judge making a decision. More specifically, if the event of “the judge said the sentence is 1 year in jail” was an event that automatically causes the emotion of depression or anger, every person in the courtroom would have had the same emotional reaction.
But the people in the court didn’t appear to have the same emotional reaction to the decisions made by the judge. For the same decision (as a hypothetical example: a 1 year jail sentence) some people seemed pleased, others shocked, some sad. With the same situation (the sentence), the people felt different emotions. So, if the event is the same for all people, there must be something different between the different people that cause the different emotions.
The difference between the people is that each person is telling themselves something different about the event. Continuing the courtroom example, if a judge decided upon a one year jail sentence there could be multiple thoughts in the courtroom instantaneously, leading to different emotions. For example:
– The defendant, “That verdict is totally unfair. I should have gotten a lighter sentence. That judge is a total jerk” – anger
– The defense lawyer, “UGH! I didn’t I make my argument well. I lost another case and now I’ll lose my job. This is terrible” – anxiety
– Defendant’s family, “I can’t believe my child did something like that. I must be a terrible parent because my kid did that” – depression
– The prosecutor, “Great, the judge agreed with me and thought my argument was persuasive. I must be a great lawyer” – happy
In the above examples, you can see how several people hearing the exact same thing (the activating event) can have different emotions.
Next time you find yourself caught up in an emotion, try to pay attention not only to the situation you are in but also the thoughts you have about that situation. It is the thoughts you have about the situation that are largely the cause of emotions. If it was the situation, everyone would always feel the same way.