Reason versus emotion

שו”ת › Category: faith › Reason versus emotion

asked 8 years ago

In the SD

Hello Rabbi,

I feel that since I began delving into your writings, especially the 5 notebooks, on the one hand I received a systematic and in-depth analysis of faith, but on the other hand I lost the intuition I had, I have already stopped feeling and experiencing the things I believe in, I have stopped trusting myself and my intuitions to prove to myself that a certain thing is true, I think about everything maybe it is not true because I do not have conclusive proof for it, and sometimes I am filled with doubts even about the nuances that you have proven in the notebooks.
The truth is that at first I felt good about it, that I don’t take things for granted but am someone who thinks and analyzes everything, but when it became a part of life it became annoying and annoying. I feel that it is difficult for me to behave in this way, and I took your method a little extreme, because by nature I don’t analyze everything to that extent but rather accept things with normal thought, relying on emotion and intuition. However, since I was exposed to your fundamental and analytical method, I have the feeling that anything that is not in this way is not true, and I have no way of proving anything to myself at such a high level, and even if I have intellectual proof, I think maybe there is a different answer to it and maybe intuition is misleading me, and things are so subtle sometimes that it is difficult to decide, and it is difficult for me to create the right balance between the analytical and the synthetic, and to live with an “emotional mind”. It seems to me that I have lost the right balance, because things that were simple to me until a year ago (like believing in God Almighty in the Torah in Chazal) suddenly became questionable despite your proofs, and to the extent that To some extent, it hurts my joy in life, when I don’t have something certain and definite to follow. I feel like this is not the way, but it’s not clear to me anymore what is and where the line is drawn.
I would be happy if you could clear my head a little.
Thank you very much.

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מיכי Staff answered 8 years ago

Hello Y. I think that even if you analyze everything, you have to know how to take it and how to relate to it. The purpose of the analysis is to examine whether you have no errors. If you haven’t found any – to fear that you might be wrong is really not constructive and not helpful. No Torah was given to the ministering angels, and humans cannot reach certainty. I have written several times that I am completely in favor of intuition, but that it should be examined in an analysis. If the analysis does not rule it out, there is no reason to abandon it. The burden of proof is on the side that rules out intuition. So suspicion of our natural feelings and intuitions is a healthy thing, but it should make us re-examine our intuitions, and after we have checked and they have not been ruled out, stick with them. Fears that I may be wrong should be ignored as long as you have no way of doing anything with them.

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י' replied 8 years ago

Basd2

Good morning,
Thank you for the response.

A. I notice that mental analysis will always give rise to doubts and it is almost never possible to reach a total decision. It is also a fact that there are people who think completely opposite to me, so of course my proof is not necessary.

B. You mention the emptiness of the analyst a lot in your articles, so I ask, if the analyst is ultimately influenced by implicit intuitive assumptions, then why not simply trust the strong intuition that I have and follow it without resorting to its analysis? After all, in any cold mental analysis there will always be subtle doubts (section a) that we will have to decide based on intuition, so we repeated the magic circle of intuition and the analysis did not add anything to me. Mental analysis should only come in the place where I have doubts about intuition and it is undermined, but without a doubt, why is analysis better when in the end it also relies on intuitions?

מיכי Staff replied 8 years ago

As I wrote, even if intuition is at the heart of analysis, analysis is still important. It can reveal contradictions between intuitions or between them and other facts and assumptions, and reveal more intuitions that you were not aware of. As long as the analysis does not contradict your intuition, there is no reason to stick with it, and vice versa.