Stop rationalizing the irrational

Why is the sky blue? Why do I find this beautiful? (Image by Gianni Crestani)

“Why?” It’s the fundamental, foundational question that is the basis for all of our scientific knowledge. As we explore why, we learn about the ways of the world.

We run into trouble when we obsess about the “why” behind feelings. Emotions are fundamentally irrational and cannot always be traced to a specific cause. When we ask our colleagues, our family members, or even ourselves about the reason behind a particular feeling, a reason may be given — but it’s not necessarily the reason. It might just be an attempt to rationalize something irrational.

For example, I may ask a seventh-grader why she doesn’t like math.

“I don’t know,” she says. “I just don’t."

But whyyyyyy?

"Well, it’s just a lot of work,” she says. “I don’t enjoy it.”

A lot of conversations follow this kind of circular reasoning, because the real reasons may go really deep (“It’s tied to the sense of failure I had in first grade when all of my friends were in the Dolphin math group and I was in the Manatee one,”) or they may be just that banal (“My math teacher assigns more homework than the other teachers”). Occasionally, you can turn up a problem that can be solved (“Math tests are always on Fridays, but I have ballet so late on Thursday that I can’t study well”). However, if the underlying reason for the dislike is based in emotions (anxiety, insecurity, embarrassment, fear, discomfort, frustration), repeatedly asking “why” and trying to probe deeper isn’t likely to resolve anything.

Sometimes, we get so desperate to have a reason for something that we keep asking why. We cling to whatever reason is offered, even if it was only given so that we would stop asking why. It is painful to feel so powerless over the anxiety, depression, or anger of a loved one; if we could only understand why, we would have a sense of control.

Ironically, by assigning a reason to someone’s troubled emotional state, we may be obscuring the path toward a solution. For instance, if I ask someone why they are too anxious to go to school, their reasons make the anxiety appear to be rational. “It’s because I can’t find my social studies textbook.” If a lost textbook is so distressing that it causes school refusal, it’s highly likely that the anxiety will continue once the textbook is found. In other words, the lost textbook was a convenient excuse and not the real reason. It’s a red herring. The anxiety itself is what must be addressed.

Our preferences and feelings are mutable and fluid. They are not to be denied or dismissed, but neither should they be taken as fact. Our emotions may be reasonable, but they aren’t rational. We can respect our own likes, dislikes, and emotional responses, and we can have compassion for those of others. When we observe feelings without judgment and without trying to determine the reasons for them, these feelings are, ironically, much more helpful to us. We don’t need to know why we feel the way we do — we just need to accept it. Our emotions have value on their own, no explanation necessary.