You argue for free will and then claim one cannot change the way they feel. That is to say that the will is not free to change one's own emotions.

New experiences bring about new emotions. That's what I mean — Blue Lux

Sure. Choose them wisely.

:wink:

Learning how to come to more acceptable terms with the same past events is a new experience.

I will grant to you that language can put in place a new feeling, but only with regard to a new configuration. I have never personally thought of something differently and then not felt that which was previously felt in accordance with that something.

But if you struggle with a mental illness that renders you with a chronic absence of positive emotions, then you are in serious trouble because this would mean your life can no longer be perceived as beautiful. If there are few moments in your life where you can feel positive emotions despite this mental illness, then you can only have few moments where your things in your life can be perceived as beautiful.

Now, I'm going to share the religious form of my worldview. I'm sharing and preaching this for anyone who can relate to it and is willing to listen to it:

Positive Emotions Are Divine States: The perception/experience of beauty, joy, greatness, and good value in our lives is vital and precious because, without it, then our lives could only be empty (valueless) or bad, horrible, tragic, and disgusting from our perspective. Therefore, this perception/experience is a vital and precious state of consciousness and that's the reason why I would describe it as being a divine state of consciousness.

Since it's divine, then I think positive emotions are god's holy light within us given that positive emotions are this perception/experience of beauty, greatness, and joy we need in our lives. Without his holy light, then we become beings of darkness through our negative emotions or empty vessels without our emotions. The goal would, therefore, be to become beings of light through our positive emotions and to avoid the negative emotions as well as apathy. Sadly, positive emotions are very fleeting things and many people struggle with depression due to no fault of their own.

This means all those depressed, genius artists who believed their lives were rich in beauty and greatness were believing a lie. It would be no different than a poor person believing he's rich when he's not. In order to be rich in the beauty and greatness in your life, then you need to be rich in positive emotions. Having little to no positive emotions can only render your life with little to no perceived beauty and greatness. Having negative emotions or no emotions at all is simply no way to live or be an artist. Especially the worst miserable emotions of your life.

We Need The Light: People who have near death experiences report they've met a being of light in the higher, heavenly realms known as "God" or "The Light." It is a ball of light that consists of pure joyful, loving, beautiful energy. Our brains are receivers that pick up on The Light's invisible spiritual energy here on Earth. It would be like how a radio picks up radio waves. Even though these waves are invisible, they still exist.

Once received by our brains, The Light's beautiful energy becomes a divine state of consciousness. It becomes a positive emotional state. Positive emotions are, therefore, the experience of The Light's divine power within us. We need this light within us to make our lives beautiful and to create a paradise here on Earth for us. Without the light, then our lives would only amount to nothing.

As for our negative emotions, this would be dark/negative energy from the lower realms picked up by our brains. So, our goal is to receive as much light as possible and to avoid receiving the darkness/negative energy as well as apathy. Sadly, there are many factors that can prevent our brains from receiving the light and it would be no different than preventing a radio from receiving the signal.

I Need To Become The Being Of Light; Not The Being Of Darkness: If I had the choice, I would choose to have no negative emotions in my life. Some people would say this is unbalanced. But, if there was an item that could only make my life horrible, bad, or disgusting, then I would obviously choose to rid of that item out of my life. I treat negative emotions as being that item. If I never had negative emotions in the first place, then I wouldn't have struggled much of my life with all those horrible miserable moments and neither would I feel violent or disgust towards myself or others.

When I have negative emotions, I become a horrible, disgusting, violent, or morbid being of darkness and I can only see things in life from a negative perspective. But, when I have my positive emotions, I become a being of light since I become something positive, beautiful, and joyful. I need to become that divine, magnificent, angelic being of light which is the reason why I would choose to only have positive emotions. But I would also want to avoid apathy since apathy is how I become an empty vessel (neither a being of light nor a being of darkness).

Euphoria Is The Best Thing: The more profound and intense the positive emotions you feel, the more beauty and joy your life has. The less degree of positive emotions you feel, the less beauty and joy your life has. This would have to mean getting high on drugs would be the most beautiful, joyful life to live. Drugs allow you to receive the greatest amount of The Light's divine energy. But I wouldn't do drugs just from the idea in my mind of the harm and consequences.

The more profound and intense the negative emotions you feel, the worse your life is. That's why we should avoid things such as emotional traumas since these are the worst emotional states that put you into the worst states of misery. If I had the choice to either live my life paralyzed in a bed feeling profound bliss or to be in the worst miserable state of my life, but live the life of my dreams, then I would choose to be the blissful vegetable in that bed because it doesn't matter how much luxury or riches I have.

Without my positive emotions, none of those things can be anything beautiful or joyful in my life. It's not about external factors such as how much money or luxury you have, how much you have helped others and contributed to the world, and neither is it about making the best of things and what mark we've made upon this world. It's all about what mental state we are in. Since positive emotions are the only mental states that bring our lives real beauty and joy, then there's nothing more to life than positive emotions.

Given this, I see no reason for others to complain and call me a pathetic, worthless human being if I have chosen to be that blissful vegetable in that bed in a pretend scenario. Rather, others should understand that positive emotions truly are the only things that can make our lives beautiful. Sure, we can help others to make them feel positive emotions. But we still need our own positive emotions to perceive that endeavor as something beautiful, great, and worthwhile.

I agree that might sound absurd, false, and ridiculous. But plenty of things that sound absurd are, in fact, true things. So, just because my worldview sounds cruel and unfair for those who struggle with depression and other mental illnesses that take away their positive emotions and just because my worldview sounds absurd and false doesn't make it false. You see, I'm all about the truth here regardless of how offensive said truth might be.

I'm not about sugar coating things and telling depressed people that their lives can still be beautiful without their positive emotions just because this is something they would like to hear. I think I've arrived at the unpleasant truth through my own personal experience and I am going to share and express that truth. I'm tired of my own emotions being dismissed as trivial things and I will speak up for myself and explain to others that they really are value judgments that give our lives value.