Emily Dickinson’s Ultra-Famous: “The Heart Wants What the Heart Wants” Quote
Selena Gomez’s new single: “The Heart Wants What the Heart Wants” totaled 10.061 million listeners on it’s first day on the radio (see lovely music video here). I bet you’re wondering: why?
I don’t think it’s her voice nor is it the melody nor is it Selena Gomez being all sexy in the music video. The lyrics of the song are incredibly painfully beautiful and so so so relatable. The emotional rawness of the song led me to listening to it exactly 47 times since I discovered it two days ago. “There’s a million reasons why I should give you up/ But the heart wants what it wants.”
The statement is for all my college peers who followed their hearts, instead of their rational minds telling them to settle for a more “wealthy and tangible” major. The statement is for all of those who are magnified to their lovers, even when there’s continuous unhealthy bickering. The statement is for that one time you blew your hard earned minimum wage salary on those $130 pair of sneakers. Just cause, right? No…there’s always more to it then a black and white: “I just wanted it.”
“The heart wants what the heart wants…is a statement made by people who can’t explain why they are in love with person xyz. It is what you say when there is no logical explanation for your actions” explains a writer on jackbenimble.blospot.com. “If love were rational…it would be easier. When I think about some of the things I have done because of love I want to scream. When I consider the self-inflicted misery I have endured I want to cry because it seems so very foolish. How could I waste so much energy on such a silly thing as [one person]. The world is filled with millions of [single people]. It should be easy to replace [him/her]. It should be as simple as changing shoes, but it is not, it is not.”
The reason why I’m such a huge Star Trek fan is that I adore the character contrast between Spock and Captain Kirk. Spock is extremely logical, disciplined and responsible. Polar opposite Captain Kirk is passionate, spontaneous and breaks rules if he truly feels his intuition overrides it. Well, who proves to be more “successful” at the end? Emotion and passion seems to “win” when Spock ends up showing a volume of emotion towards the climax of the movie.
What does psychology say about (heart) emotional reasoning vs (brain) intellectual reasoning?
“The head is always fooled by the heart,” La Rochefoucauld’s famous maxim. Well, why can’t the heart just proceed on to follow it’s gut instead of allowing the brain to interrupt it? Jon Elster explains that humans want to maintain their self-image of being “in control with reason” so we like to think we’re swayed by reason, rather than passion. This actually backfires and makes us so addicted to irrationality, rather than rationality. A rational person is well-aware that under certain situations, it’s acceptable to follow your heart over your brain.
According to westsidetoastmasters.com, human beings react based on emotions, but like to justify our actions with logic and facts. We’re persuaded by reason, but we’re truly moved by emotion. Several social science studies conclude that up to 90% of the decisions we make are based on our emotions.
With all that said, do you think the heart (almost) always overrides our brain? Even if our intellectual reasoning (aka our brain) is “leading”, do you think the heart is the underlining factor giving us motivation to continue on (for ex: studying up all night requires our brain but, is it not our hearts that know we truly have a destination we want to reach? And we can only reach it if we pass this class?).
Xoxo,
Chrissy
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/in-the-name-love/201201/my-heart-has-mind-its-own
http://wwwjackbenimble.blogspot.com/2007/10/heart-wants-what-heart-wants.html
http://westsidetoastmasters.com/resources/laws_persuasion/chap14.html
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