Emotional Agency – What is it and why does it matter?

Emotional agency. Every one of us has it, but what is it? Let us begin with agency. No, not a place where one might go to arrange a trip (travel agency) or for a photo shoot (modeling agency) or to book a gig (talent agency). Merriam-Webster defines agency as (2) the capacity, condition, or state of acting or of exerting power; and defines agent as (1) one that acts or exerts power. An agent is simply an autonomous individual. We are all agents as functioning individuals. Given this background, emotional agency is the characteristic of being a human experiencing emotions. How we experience and react to (or act upon) emotions is unique to every person and every unique situation, so understanding these concepts is key to successfully navigating our emotions.

I have my own definition of emotional agency. To me, it means taking responsibility for one’s emotions. I define taking responsibility as understanding what emotions are, understanding that emotions always involve situations, therefore situational awareness is key because of the need to recognize when situations change. It means understanding our role in situations based upon our reactions and their resulting actions and reactions. I base this on an updated Stoic interpretation of Franciso Gallegos’ article in the Journal of Philosophy of Emotion (Winter 2019) in which he works with Furtak’s framework of emotions. While I do not disagree with the composite structure of emotions as described by Gallegos and Furtak, I disagree with the concept of emotions as agents themselves. I will highlight one of each of their ideas, then present my interpretation from a “modern” stoic perspective. So before we talk about emotional agency, a word about emotions themselves.

Francisco Gallegos expands on Rick Furtak’s theory of Emotional Recognition in which Furtak posits that emotions recognize evaluative qualities of objects within situations. Gallegos (2019) says of emotional agency that “Imagine an emotional agent who responds emotionally to the things they encounter in deep and wholehearted ways, while at the same time responding to them in their specificity and in their full complexity. What would be required to develop our emotional agency to achieve this ideal? Or would this ideal only be realizable by some sort of sage who has transcended our ordinary human limitations?” I will offer a possible answer to this question presently. Gallegos quotes Furtak: Emotions, he says, “embody a kind of understanding that is accessible to us only by means of our affective experience. Specifically, it is only through the emotions that we are capable of recognizing the value or significance of anything whatsoever” (Furtak 2018, 3). But even if we agree that emotions embody a kind of understanding, we haven’t established what emotions are.

I suggest that the nature of emotions, or what emotions “are” is as follows: emotions are the sum of the physical and psychological ramifications of our reactions to any specific set of circumstances or other entities. Emotions are thought clusters. But they are thought clusters to which we attach meanings or values, depending on what factors are involved in a given situation and our perceived evaluations of these situational factors. This is what Furtak correctly calls a stoic interpretation. However, while I don’t grant emotions the quality of being agents themselves, I certainly do not mock them or devalue the insights that emotions or emotional awareness can give us. Emotional awareness or “having EQ – emotional quotient” is a valued skill in the business world. And in the business world emotional awareness is considered a skill, albeit a soft skill.

Students or close followers of philosophy will recognize that these are two different perspectives on the same situation, in lay terms two sides of the same coin. The views of Gallegos and Furtak are phenomenological and my position lands on the cognitivist side. I think that the quality of sanity is equal to the quality of self-control. This is rationality. I think that the loss or absence of rationality is equal to loss of self-control. Therefore loss of self-control and irrationality are equal to insanity. In lay terms, this is known as temporary insanity, being out of one’s mind, out of control, or hysterical. I think that people who are described as being stoic actually suffer from a significant mischaracterization. Stoics are criticized as being unfeeling or judgmental of others’ susceptibility to emotionality. One needn’t judge what Gallegos calls the depth of someone’s emotionality. If a stoic observes an emotional person “losing it,” they don’t write that person off as insane or irrational. The stoic understands that emotions are human and normal, and that it is the stoic who is the exception. Therefore the stoic has no right to expect everyone to be as they are, and the stoic accepts this as a statistical reality. While there is no feeling of looking down on a person experiencing an emotional reaction, the stoic’s reaction in that situation can easily be perceived as judgmental because of its detachment. This brings me back to emotional agency.

Emotions are closely related to moods in that moods are comprised of our collective intents or reactions to situations, whether real or perceived. Emotional agency includes being responsible for being aware that we are experiencing a real or perceived shift in the balance of our awareness of a particular set of circumstances. Gallegos refers to responding emotionally… in deep and wholehearted ways (as cited above). Even in the phenomenological definition, this is not a one-step process. Gallegos and Furtak write about emotions recognizing the evaluative properties of components of a situation. I argue that this is simply a phenomenological interpretation of the cognitivist view that we direct our attention to people or things in a situation and we evaluate them. When we weigh these evaluations against our understandings, expectations or desires, the result is a reaction: an emotion or emotional response. However, because we are all faced with multiple situations daily, and many of these situations change while we are still in them, it is not productive to be constantly reacting emotionally. When we find ourselves in a situation and we notice an emotional response, we usually think about it before we act on it. In the common vernacular, this is often called having filters.

In my view, emotional agency is related to Aristotle’s virtue ethics, in that a virtuous person strives always to achieve and maintain balance in life. This can only be done with practice, by building habits. Emotional agency requires significant effort. In order to be a fully effective emotional agent, one must be: 1) aware of the situation, 2) aware of his/her role in the situation, 3) aware of the roles of the other actors in the situation, 4) aware of the influences or mitigating factors in not only his/her position, but those of the other actors.

An objection to these claims might argue that some reactions simply overpower our ability to control them. My wife will be the first to remind me that I often fail in managing my own anger response (includes frustration or impatience). From the stoic and cognitive perspective, it is easy and true to admit that in a situation where the only actors are she and I, or my close family, I don’t filter anything at all. To that I will honestly reply that not filtering is a conscious, almost automatic evaluation and decision that in that company, it is fine to experience my emotions fully. And the truth is that as a stoic, this is a failure on my part because my projection onto them and into their experience is one of negativity. Since reading Gallegos’ works on emotions and moods, I have renewed my commitment to bringing this emotion into line with all the others. This is as a matter of ethics, and of course common decency and respect for the people I love most.

Stoic emotional agency is difficult. Perhaps it is best for the artist, because a pure narcissist wouldn’t bother to check any emotion. This brand of emotional agency does NOT mean that stoics don’t have feelings. In fact they are torn by knowing the effort that it requires to maintain balance, and often times this emotional control (suppression) may create negative feelings such as sorrow, pain or regret.

Gallegos reminds us of what he calls “a quasi-ethical ideal of responding emotionally to the things we encounter in ways “does them justice” and “gives them their due”.” Ultimately, I don’t disagree with allowing ourselves to feel these emotions and even to feel them deeply. I merely add that we need not publicly make an outward display of every emotional reaction.

 

References

Furtak, Rick Anthony. 2018. Knowing Emotions: Truthfulness and Recognition in Affective Experience. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Gallegos, Francisco. 2019.  What Are Emotions For? From Affective Epistemology to Affective Ethics. Journal of Philosophy of Emotion.

Merriam-Webster Dictionary. Retrieved from http:// https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/agency