Emotions In Business

June 27th, 2008 | by Chris |

Using feelings when it comes to business instead of your logic can be a recipe for disaster. It can lead you to make all the wrong choices and find yourself soon in a dead end with no hope in the horizon, or put it simply to fail. But on the other hand if you combine them both in your decision making process some very interesting things can happen.

First of all no matter how much we praise logic we humans are basically emotional beings and we base the majority of decisions and choices we make on feelings. In such cases afterwards we use logic to rationalize the decisions we make.

Second from a spiritual perspective while feelings are reason enough to live and the driving force for everything we do in life, from a biological perspective is a form of decision making mechanism. While the conscious mind can only process a very small amount of information, the unconscious can process a huge load and give us its feedback in the form of feelings. The only problem is that is based on the most part on past experiences and can misguide us.

From a biological perspective for someone living in the wild it made more sense to be safe than sorry because sorry meant dead in most of cases under that circumstances. But in today’s modern society where survival is not on the line like in social interactions and business, play for safety and security is not always the best option that can give us the results we want.

Buildings in Engaku-ji
Photo by David Baron

But how this info can be used in our case?

Well, both feelings and logic can be tools in a decision making process, each one with its flaws and limitations respectively but you should be aware of them. Emotion can give us wrong signals some times or more often and logic may not have taken into consideration variables that our unconscious mind did, making the latter one right in case of a conflict between them.

You should both use them with a critical and aware mind. In cases of both giving the green light or the red one in something it is clear what you should do. But the trouble begins when they give you conflicting signals. You need to examine them both and draw your own conclusions on which one is right in every case.

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