firecat

...to draw some defining lines around the phrase "emotional extravagance."

In my brain, it's still a fuzzy concept of the "I know it when it irritates me" variety.

It's not just, or even primarily, about displaying emotions. It's also, or even more, about stuff like amplifying one's emotions, spending a lot of time and energy thinking about and talking about one's emotions, expecting/wanting other people to spend a lot of time thinking/talking about one's emotions, letting one's emotions be primary drivers of one's actions, letting one's emotions be primary determinants of the life story one carries around in one's head and tells others.

(All that stuff would be happening publicly/semi-publicly in order to count, since if it's happening only inside one's head, I wouldn't know about it and it wouldn't irritate me.)

Unpacking "amplifying one's emotions": In my experience, if I have a feeling of mild to moderate intensity, I can do three things: I can leave it alone, I can damp/suppress it (not snuff it completely, but lower its intensity), or I can increase it / whip it up. Amplifying an emotion would be deliberately increasing its intensity.

More as it occurs to me.

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From:

rmjwell.livejournal.com

It's also, or even more, about stuff like amplifying one's emotions, spending a lot of time and energy thinking about and talking about one's emotions, expecting/wanting other people to spend a lot of time thinking/talking about one's emotions, letting one's emotions be primary drivers of one's actions, letting one's emotions be primary determinants of the life story one carries around in one's head and tells others.

Fascinating. What you describe here maps to my sense of people who seem to... process more than do anything with the results of their processing.

In that regard I find myself in agreement with you.

From:

firecat

Processing without doing anything with the processing is a form of extravagance or energy-wasting, but it doesn't map completely onto emotional extravagance because processing isn't always emotionally based and also because emotional extravagance can also be talking a lot about one's emotions without processing about them.

When you say you agree with me, do you mean you have a problem with gerbil-wheel processing that's your problem and not anyone else's? Or do you mean that you dislike gerbil-wheel processing?

From:

rmjwell.livejournal.com

but it doesn't map completely onto emotional extravagance because processing isn't always emotionally based and also because emotional extravagance can also be talking a lot about one's emotions without processing about them.

Good points both. I wasn't as clear wth my language as I should've been. I didn't mean to say it was a one-to-one mapping, but your description seems to resonate with what I described. Does that make more sense?

do you mean that you dislike gerbil-wheel processing?

I dislike chronic gerbil-wheel processing; I understand how it can occur in a specific problem situation. But I get weary of witnessing it over and over and over for every problem.

And the weariness is my problem.

From:

kalmn.livejournal.com

i agree with the weariness being your problem.

i do think, though, that that doesn't mean that chronic gerbil wheel processing *isn't* a problem.

just that it's not yours or mine to fix.

From:

rmjwell.livejournal.com

Trust me. I've gotten plenty of applications of real-world aversion therapy to keep me from trying to fix someone else's gerbil-wheeling (I'm sorry, I like the evocative quality too much not to verb it).

I think this thread highlights an area that I've seen (both in myself and in other folks) cause problems. Namely the difference in meaning between

I have a problem with my particular behavior.

I have a problem witnessing/experiencing a particular behavior.

&

I have a problem with my particular behavior when witnessing/experiencing a particular behavior (not necessarily the same particular behavior).

because all three meanings can be derived from the same sentence "I have a problem with [particular behavior]."

Again, just thinking out loud.