WEBVTT

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What if I said to you

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that the violent criminals
and sex offenders inside Taipei Prison

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are much better
at controlling their emotions

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than our university students?

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Would you believe me?

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Since I do psychological research,

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I often have the opportunity
to go to different places

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and get to know
different kinds of people.

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Over the past few years,

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in addition to working
with university students,

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I've also visited Taipei Prison often.

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What I just mentioned
is the result of our latest study.

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When we started,

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we were a little surprised too.

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Emotion. What is it exactly?

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Is it good or bad?

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Do you want to have them?

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I started working part time
when I was in high school.

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I was told very early on,

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"When you come to work,
leave your emotions at the door."

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Then I learned what people meant
by the word "professional."

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A very important part of it
is to not have emotions.

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Not to get angry when you 
encounter someone unreasonable.

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Not to cry when you feel sad.

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That's in the workplace.

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At home, if you have a 
disagreement with your family,

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they might say to you,
"Don't be so emotional."

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Emotions: when you have them, it's like
you've become a second-class citizen.

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What you say is reasonable but useless.

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Now you might say,

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"That's just your generation.
Kids today are different.

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They have a well-rounded
training from a young age."

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Is that so?

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Early this year,
we started a research project

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to get elementary students to identify
their emotions and develop their EQ.

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In class we asked the children,

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"What is anger?

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Do you remember
the last time you were angry?"

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The children replied,

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"I don't know.

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I don't. Mom and Dad 
say I shouldn't get angry.

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Our teacher says it's bad to get angry."

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As we can see, nobody
seems to like having emotions.

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Why hasn't evolution
just gotten rid of them?

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How have they managed
to survive until today?

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There are many reasons.

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An important one is
that they can save lives.

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Maybe not as many lives 
as the previous speakers have,

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but they can still save lives.

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(Laughter)

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I once had a patient

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who was a successful
career woman on Wall Street.

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She first came to me hoping
to get to know herself better

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so she could develop her leadership skills
and become a better leader.

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She shared with me that when working
in a male-dominated environment,

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you can't reveal your 
weaknesses and frailties.

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After a long time working like this,
you learn to suppress your emotions.

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During the time I counseled her, 
she started having marital problems.

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Her relationship with her 
husband became unstable.

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One time during a fight,

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he picked up a glass from the table
and flung it at her.

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She quickly got out of the way.

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The glass hit the wall,

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and there were
shards of glass everywhere.

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Afterwards, I asked her a question

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that all psychologists 
eventually ask their patients:

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"How did you feel?"

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"How did you feel?"

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She said, "I felt angry.
How can he treat me like this?"

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I said, "What else?"

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She said "I felt hopeless.

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When I first married him,
he wasn't like this."

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Are there any emotions

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that you think
you'd have in this situation,

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that she hadn't mentioned?

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Fear.

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What happens when we're scared?

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We flee.

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What happens when we are angry?

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We attack the other person.

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If we can't correctly
identify our emotions,

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instead of running away in fear,

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we might think we're angry
and attack someone;

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this can lead to
very serious consequences.

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This woman had stifled

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and ran away from her emotions
and insecurities for so long

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that she had forgotten
what it is to feel fear.

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Her situation was urgent,

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and I couldn't teach her
in such a short time

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how to experience fear again.

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So I don't have the chance to reestablish
this kind of "circuit" in her brain.

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This is a diagram of the brain,
the one you've just seen.

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When we experience fear,

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the information
from the body's five senses -

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what we see, 
what we hear and so on -

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is passed from the thalamus

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to the sensory cortex for processing.

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The hippocampus,
which is in charge of memory,

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will download the relevant
information from the situation

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and send it to the amygdala
for comparison.

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The amygdala stores
our previous experiences of fear.

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It evaluates the level of danger
compared to past experiences

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and then orders the hypothalamus
to make an appropriate response.

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You can see that in this circuit,

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past experiences and memories
play a very important role.

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But we didn't have enough time
to reestablish it.

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So we could only work
on awareness and recognition.

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I told this woman,
"The next time this happens,

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no matter how you feel,
you have to call 911 immediately."

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We went over it repeatedly,

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and in the end, there was a time
when they fought again.

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This time, her husband grabbed a knife.

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Afterwards, she told me 
she was angry at the time,

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she looked at him
and hesitated for a few seconds,

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but because of what we practiced,
she eventually called 911.

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Fortunately, the police
arrived within 7 minutes

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and tragedy was avoided.

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Emotions can direct our actions
and decide their consequences.

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Correctly identifying emotions 
can save your life.

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Of course, this is a more extreme example.

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On the less extreme side,

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our research keeps telling us
that our physical and mental health,

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our academic achievements
and job performance,

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our leadership skills and creativity

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are all intimately related
to our emotions.

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But what exactly are emotions?

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In fact, they're a kind of feeling,

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our own subjective experience.

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They can be influenced by many things.

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Like our thoughts and opinions.

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They can also lead to different actions,
like attacking someone.

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"I'm so angry because
I think you tricked me!

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So I'm going to hit you."

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My thinking could be wrong
because I misunderstood you.

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My behavior could also be wrong,

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because I shouldn't hit people
when I'm angry.

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But feelings themselves
aren't right or wrong,

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correct or incorrect, good or bad.

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In the United States,
you'll often hear people say,

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"You shouldn't feel that way."

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I hate it when people say that.

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It's like if I said to you, "I'm so cold!"

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And you replied, "Then stop feeling cold!"

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(Laughter)

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This is your own subjective experience.

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Nobody has the right to tell you

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that what you're experiencing
is right or wrong, good or bad.

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At this point you might ask,

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"Are you saying
that the criminals in prison

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got there just because of
emotional problems?"

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I remember when I was in 
Taipei Prison evaluating them,

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I asked them the same kind of question:

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"How did you feel when you did this?"

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They immediately responded,
"I know. Pissed off!"

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Then I asked, "So what could you do
to feel a little better?"

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They said, "I know!" right away.

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"I felt much better 
after beating them up."

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(Laughter)

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On the other hand, when I ask
college students, "How do you feel?"

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They say, "I don't know."

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(Laughter)

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"Then, what could you do to feel better?"

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"I don't know ..."

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(Laughter)

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So it would appear

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that the prison inmates are much better
at identifying and regulating emotions

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than college students.

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The problem is how you
express your emotions.

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All feelings are okay.

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But even though it's okay to get angry,
I shouldn't hit people.

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We taught elementary students
about EQ, emotional quotient.

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How to correctly identify your emotions,

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and the correct way of expressing them.

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All feelings are okay.

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That doesn't mean all perceptions are true
or that all behaviors are acceptable,

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but all feelings are okay.

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Even though all feelings
are subjective experiences,

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there are a few fundamental emotions

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that every person will frequently have.

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This goes across cultures.

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Today, if you met someone

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with a completely different 
background, culture, or language,

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you'd still be able to correctly identify
the six fundamental emotions

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through their facial expressions.

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Other emotions can be hard to distinguish 
because of cultural differences,

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but everyone will frequently have 
these fundamental emotions.

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Every time I talk about this in Chinese,

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I'll hear people whisper the phrase
"Happiness, anger, sorrow, joy."

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(Laughter)

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Happiness and joy are the same thing!

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So since we speak Chinese,
we can guess those three.

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What about the other three?

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Surprise. Fear. Disgust.

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Everyone regularly
experiences these emotions.

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But the intensity and outward
expression of these emotions

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will vary from person to person,
and also depending on the situation.

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I once had a colleague
who was a developmental psychologist.

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He was also a very typical American.

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He once asked me,
"Hey, how often do you cry?"

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I said, "One or two times a year.

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Maybe three."

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He said, "Ah! That's so unhealthy!"

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(Laughter)

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Obviously you don't think so, right?

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I said, "So how many times
do you cry in a year?"

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He said, "Three times I cry a little,
and five times I cry a lot."

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(Laughter)

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Is that healthier?

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Everyone gets sad, but that's not to say
that whenever someone feels sad,

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they necessarily will cry.

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The intensity and outward 
expression can differ.

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I just said, everyone has 
these emotions regularly.

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Looking at these six emotions,

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can you tell me, or rather tell yourself,

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when was the last time you had them?

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If you say, "I don't remember,"

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or you haven't felt them 
for a few months or a year,

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that doesn't mean you haven't had them;

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rather, it means you haven't noticed them.

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You ignored them,

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or perhaps you suppressed them
or distracted yourself from them.

NOTE Paragraph

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If we look once more
at the six fundamental emotions,

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only one of them is positive: happiness.

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Surprise can be good or bad.

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The other four are all negative.

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Nobody likes negative emotions.

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They feel bad.

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But they still have
a reason for existence.

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They can warn you and let you know

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that if you don't make some changes,
there could be danger.

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It's just like pain.

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Nobody likes pain.

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But if I accidentally put my hand
on top of a hot stove

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and I didn't feel pain,
I wouldn't know to withdraw my hand.

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Recently, there has been a worrying trend 
in developed countries:

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people are trying very hard 
to avoid having negative emotions.

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Recently when I was in the United States,
I went into a drugstore.

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Their drugstores are a bit like 
Watsons here in Taiwan.

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They don't just sell medicine there, 
but also many daily necessities.

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I couldn't help but take 
this picture when I was there.

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(Laughter)

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There was an entire wall 
just selling pain killers, pain relief.

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What we call OTC, over the counter drugs,
which are very easy to obtain.

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If you look at sales data for OTC drugs,
you'll see that for the past few years,

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pain killers are always number one.

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The question is, Now what?

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After you've taken pain killers,
will the problem just go away?

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Maybe, but there's also a chance
that the problem will get worse.

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It's the same as the feeling of pain.

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I used to work as an EMT.

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That is, working in an ambulance as
an emergency medical technician.

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When we got to the site
of the emergency,

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no matter how much pain 
someone was experiencing,

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we couldn't give them 
any painkillers or anesthetics.

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If we did that, then they
wouldn't feel pain anymore,

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and we might make an error.

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We might delay giving first aid
or make a misdiagnosis.

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Negative emotions are the same way.

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If you try to escape from them
by ignoring or suppressing them,

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the problem won't just go away.

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It might fester
until it becomes more serious.

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Recently in the news,

00:13:25.634 --> 00:13:29.103
you hear about people
who explode without warning

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and commit some unspeakable action.

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One reason for this could be

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that they've suppressed warnings
from their emotions.

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In fact, negative emotions
are very important.

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It's here to stay
and isn't going to be phased out.

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Since we don't have a choice,

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can we try to look at them
from a different perspective?

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They're actually not that scary.

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There are times
when they can be very intense,

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but they don't last forever.

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I once had a patient tell me,
"I'm trying really hard not to cry!"

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I asked, "Why?"

00:14:05.942 --> 00:14:08.731
He said, "I'm afraid if I cry,
I won't be able to stop."

00:14:08.745 --> 00:14:10.885
I said to him, "Don't worry.

00:14:10.896 --> 00:14:12.295
That's impossible."

00:14:12.295 --> 00:14:13.468
(Laughter)

00:14:13.885 --> 00:14:16.838
Have you ever known or heard of someone

00:14:16.839 --> 00:14:20.515
who started crying and never stopped?

00:14:21.303 --> 00:14:24.137
Emotions don't last forever.

00:14:24.140 --> 00:14:26.675
That's the nature of emotions.

00:14:26.675 --> 00:14:30.929
So while happiness won't last forever,
neither will sadness.

00:14:31.297 --> 00:14:38.123
Emotions make the finer things in life
more clear and distinct.

00:14:38.321 --> 00:14:41.505
For example, someone
who has never experienced loss

00:14:41.548 --> 00:14:46.154
will have a limited understanding
of what it means to have something.

00:14:47.019 --> 00:14:50.970
We innately have so many
different kinds of emotions,

00:14:52.121 --> 00:14:54.664
just like the colors
on an artist's palette.

00:14:54.702 --> 00:14:57.673
If we use a little more color

00:14:58.049 --> 00:15:01.329
and attentively experience each emotion,

00:15:02.170 --> 00:15:04.776
maybe, just maybe,

00:15:04.776 --> 00:15:09.560
we can create a more colorful,
elegant, and enriching life.

00:15:09.560 --> 00:15:10.625
Thank you.

00:15:10.625 --> 00:15:11.903
(Applause)