How to Generate Emotions

Theory

The practices that follow can be used to generate high intensity emotion. The parts of our psyche that generate emotions are like light bulbs. The more energy you send through them, the brighter they become. What’s more, they grow stronger with use. You can think of these parts of the psyche as emotion generators. You may notice that when you feel an emotion, it can sometimes feel like a kind of glow, warmth, or flowing somewhere within the body. This glow is created when one of those generators lights up.

These generators can be activated in a variety of ways. They exhibit the properties of both radiance and resonance. Like a light bulb, they radiate emotion outwards whenever they become energized. Like a resonator, they absorb energy whenever they are exposed to a force that resonates with them. Thoughts, actions, and experiences can all generate the kind of resonance that energizes an emotion generator. Not only that, but certain mental actions can trigger the flow of energy through one of these generators. When that happens, they will ignite, and you will feel an emotion.

To generate emotions, we are going to tap into these principles. We will use the imagination to create experiences in order to generate resonance. This will create the first spark. Then, we learn several mental actions that trigger the flow of energy through these emotion generators. Finally, we will end with a particularly powerful mental action for increasing the intensity of the emotion. The technique involves radiating emotion outwards from our body. This has the effect of dialing up the heat, so to speak.

When you make an intention to move energy outwards, it increases the charge in that generator. This is part of the reason why clinging to your emotions makes them go away, while releasing them makes them bigger. They are light bulbs. They are built for outward expansion, for sending light outwards in all directions. Structurally, there is no difference between giving your emotions away and increasing the intensity of your emotions. They both cause your emotional state to radiate outwards.

Now, enough explanation. Let’s begin the practice.

Practice

To generate and intensify emotions, there are two fundamental steps to learn:

(1) First, you must learn how to generate the spark.

(2) Second, you must learn how to grow that spark into a stronger emotion.

For the technique that follows, you can select any emotion that you want. For my example, I will use the emotion of joy.

We begin by connecting with an emotion to generate that first spark. To do this, we use the imagination.

Connecting with an Emotion

Imagine a time when you felt happy and joyful. Really lean into these images. Conjure more of these images and engage with your imagination until the feeling of joy begins to surface within you. Once the emotion surfaces, connect with it. Hold that feeling in awareness. See if you can sense its uplifting and soaring quality.

Now, alternate between the images and the feeling. See if you can intensify them. The emotions and the imagery feed back into each other in an upward spiral. As you imagine the scenarios that inspire joy, the feeling grows, and as you focus on the joy, more images surface within your mind.

Nurture this feeling. Explore as seems best to you. As you continue to practice, you will find your balance, and you will learn to grow this spark. You can continue with this practice to gradually increase the intensity of the emotion, using both the imagination and awareness of the feeling.

The preceding instructions are a complete practice by themselves. However, we can take this further. There are several different methods for intensifying emotions, and we will walk through each of them in turn.

Moving Sensation with the Imagination

For the first method, we connect with the sensation of joy that we have cultivated up to this point. Then, we imagine that joy in our feet. We feel this joy begin to pour into our body, filling it like a vessel. This joy begins to rise, filling our feet, and then our calves, and then our thighs. It rises to the abdomen, then the chest, and spills over into our arms. Finally, the joy fills our entire body.

Feel this joy in your body, and then begin again from the top of the head this time and begin infusing joy downward through your body. First joy saturates your head, and then your chest, your abdomen, your thighs, your calves, and then your feet.

You may repeat this process as many times as you wish. Each time, you infuse more joy into your body.

When you are ready, move on to the next method.

Whole Body Breathing

Begin by imagining that you are in the center of an infinite ocean of joy. This joy is a brilliant light. Let it assume any color you prefer.

Feel the ocean of joy growing dense with emotion. The pressure seems to rise, and the joy surrounding you intensifies to such a degree that it begins to exert a pressure on your skin.

When you are ready, inhale and absorb this energy with your whole body. Breathe joy in as if you were a sponge soaking up water. Breathe joy in and out and feel it as it saturates your body.

Continue in this practice for as long as you are comfortable. When you are ready, move on to the next practice.

Radiating Emotion Outward

We are going to radiate emotion outwards. Doing this dramatically intensifies the energy. To do this, we are going to imagine that we are giving our joy away to others, that we are offering it to the world. The act of giving raises the level of energy, causing us to experience the emotion even more powerfully.

Connect with the feeling of joy. Wish that all beings might experience this joy. Then, send the joy forth from your body, radiating it out into the world in front of you. Send the joy to your, to your left, and then send it behind you. Send it above you and send it below you. Finally, imagine that you are radiating this joy in all directions.

Continue in this practice for as long as you wish.