Your Stomach Churning? You Are Emotionally Invested That's Why.

Young white man takes an assault rifle to a protest, murders two people and wounds another. He is arrested, charged and gets out of bail. Celebrates publicly, goes to court and is found not guilty of any crime. Oh well, that's fine. A young white girl joins a protest to fight a pipeline which could destroy water ways, she is shot with a "projectile" by police and almost loses an arm. Oh well that's fine. People are working at jobs which barely cover daily living and yet some rich guys are building rockets to go for a five minute ride into space. Oh well it's fine. 

Feeling the anger? Feeling hopeless? Feeling sad? Feeling the rage? Well you are not alone. The football team you cheer for just lost (again) and it is upsetting. Your favorite 3-year old horse at the Kentucky Derby has not won the Triple Crown. You want them to put it down, that's how much money you lost, I mean that's how much the horse meant to you. You can't see them as a loser. The star of your life is WWE Sasha Banks and she just won the champion belt. You are beyond happy. Your joy is so high you jump up and down. You jump on to your coffee table and jump again, your head hits the rotating ceiling fan and cuts off an ear. After you wake up in the Ambulance your happy again (and it's not just the morphine). 

You are emotionally invested. When things go bad, or wrong with your investment you have negative feelings, negative reactions. When things go good with your investment you feel good as well. How invested we are of course may affect our reactions to how the investment went. Like me for instance, I am like the next person and I cheer for my favorite thing, person, sport, puppy in the Bud Super Bowl tv commercials and what have you. With the various items if things go the way I want (or not) the reactions will vary. It all depends on how emotionally invested I am. Like with entertainment it is not a situation where I will smash the television if my team loses. Nor will I run outside in the cold winter weather and strip off my clothes in a dance of joy. I see there are folks, people who live and die by their emotional investment with a team, an event, an entertainer or even a place. You see them literally wearing their emotional investments on their sleeves; team sportswear. There are people who like a team they wear foam Cheese on their heads, now that is emotionally invested. We sure love to share our "likes" and show how much we love those likes with a big thumbs up. 

There are many things we emotional invest in: our families, our friends, our community, our history, our jobs, our hobbies, our goods like our cars. I mean who doesn't like a nice car? Heck some folks name their cars? I understand naming your private "goods" (your penis, your vagina) but naming your car Bertha? We emotional invest in our lives whether things are good or bad. The boyfriend who punches you, picks you up and throws you against a tv and then again picks you up and throws on your baby's chair. The boss in our job we are emotionally invested in is a predator, a cobra, a slithery snake and just cruel. But we love our boyfriends, our jobs, even our bosses so we endure the pain. Emotionally investment has rewards and it comes with punishment as well. When we emotionally invest we are vulnerable. Vulnerable to having our hearts ripped out and squashed up into a ball of mush. 

Speaking of mush, governments, business and non-governmental organizations came together to discuss the climate change (crisis is actually what it is). The outcome of the gathering (COP global response to the threat of climate change) was a disappointment for many. There is a feeling, a collective feeling of hopelessness out there in the world. There is so much strife we don't know where to begin trying to make sense of the world. We love the Earth and people or at least we should, shouldn't we? The Earth is nothing short of a miracle that gives us everything. But do we care? Many of us have a very strong emotional attachment, an incredible emotional investment in the Earth. We wear it on our sleeves. There are so many souls who have emotionally invested with the well being of the Earth. People will try hard to show their love of the Earth: from spiking trees so loggers can't cut down old growth forests, to chaining themselves to trees and even going on hunger strikes to bring attention to the damage being done to the Earth. Most of those efforts are met with attacks. Business along with government support, resources and weapons will combat those individuals who emotional invest in saving their community, saving the Earth. It is still incredibly stupid how business and governments behave when it comes to resource extraction. The "Earth is shaking like a dog trying to shed its fleas" and still people ignore the signs. The Earth is burning and still there are people wanting to add fuel to the fire. This is why people are fucking upset, feeling hopeless, feeling angry, feeling rage. 

Why the business, the governments are not emotionally invested in the Earth, their families, their communities is weird. It is like they have a greater emotional attachment to money than anything else. Isn't that pencil chewing crazy, bat licking crazy, eating out of a toilet bowl crazy? My friend was telling me about this very rich white man who died a couple of weeks ago. He said "You know what? He must be the richest one among those other corpses." Yeah all those rich people wanting to be the richest one in the grave yard. You know what is really toad licking crazy? There are many people who fully support those old white guys spending money to ride into space. People praise those Billionaires like they were Elvis or something. Guess what? Elvis had sex with a 14 year old girl. Still praising him? Still invested in his star? The thing is these rich arseholes have no absolutely no regard, no inkling of a thought about you, never mind emotionally investing in your well being, heck no. You might as well be a piss stain on their shorts, you mean that much. So why emotionally invest in a being who is only emotionally invested in cash? Are we rock in a pond of mud stupid? 

Let's take a moment and take stock of what we like, what we are willing to like, to feel good about and to love. I like people and when I see them hurting, it hurts me. I am emotionally invested. How about you?