Emotions

A2: "I wish anger didn't exist as an emotion."

A1 and I have been arguing quite a lot over the past few days. I guess he's been pushing my buttons and I have been explosively reactive. When I ask him to help with something and he responds with, "I'm not in the mood to be helpful right now," the fireworks fly. And A2 ends up in tears.

A2: "I wish we only had two emotions: sadness and happiness."

A1: "Sadness? Why wouldn't you only want happiness?"

A2: "We need sadness because, if a baby were hungry but happy all the time, they wouldn't be able to tell us they need to eat. So they could starve to death."

A1: "I think anger's important too, because it helps us through our fears. Anger always leads to fear. And anger comes from fear."

A2: "And if we didn't have fear, we might just walk up to a cougar and say, 'Here kitty, kitty ...' and then, Gulp! We'd be eaten by the cougar."