After being swept away by an emotion, most people make one of two pacts: “I’ll never be taken over again,” or “I can’t help it, it just happens.” Joe points out that both leave you controlled by the emotion. One controls you by carrying you off; the other controls you by forcing you to spend your energy holding it down.
“It’s either controlling us by taking us away or it’s controlling us by forcing us to manage it. It’s what I call the rebel dilemma.”
The rebel dilemma is his name for the trap. If someone says “tie your shoe,” the compliant person ties it and the rebel refuses—but both are equally controlled by the command. Suppressing an emotion is just the rebel’s version of being run by it. The way out isn’t a better strategy for control; it’s a third option entirely, where the emotion is neither obeyed nor fought but allowed to move through. Only then does it stop being your master and start being information you can choose what to do with.
Related Concepts
- Suppressing emotions has a physical price the body pays
- When emotions become fluid they give you signals instead of controlling you
- Don’t do emotions at people
- Fully felt and unresisted, every emotion becomes a virtue
- Rebellion empowers the authority figure just as compliance does
- Rebellion secretly wants connection
- The pressure-resist cycle is a game to avoid feeling sadness
- Surrender into love prevents self-betrayal