Imagine a hypothetical country, which is as developed in science and technology as any modern world country is. A peculiarity about it is that it is that people have extraordinary sense of humor. The humor won’t be funny anymore, it gets obnoxious after sometime because it comes in the way of very basic communication.
PC-person (peculiar country): starts with Hehe, haha
We: Is there anything funny about me?
PC: funny? Oh you’re so funny, please stop it.
We: But I haven’t even said anything.
PC: anything? Anything, dude, whatever, haha.
An exact opposite exact scenario: A country where men and women are cranky, cranky as when one gets when he/she becomes a “captain-backfire”. The above conversation in such a country can get you into trouble.
PC: (grunts at you) huh!! Huff!!
We: Is there anything funny about me?
PC: funny? (Hits you on the nose) Oh you’re so funny (slaps you), please stop it (that’ll be you)
We: But I haven’t even said anything.
PC: anything? (His expression says you ruined his life), anything, dude, whatever!! Huh!! (Grunts again)
Such a thing will happen if people are never taught to control the emotions. When we’re born, we usually either cry, laugh or are really curious; basically on the extreme ends of human emotions. But as time passes by, we are taught to develop hooks, on which we can hang our reactions.
Thinking about it, it seems that we lose lot of our spontaneity because of the toning down. The levels of loss obviously vary from person to person, but the loss is usually big. Even if someone decides to be more spontaneous, it will come only after constant conscious internalization. Being creative is related a lot to being spontaneous.
Everybody likes spontaneity, that is what gives us more joy more times than not. But, one of the above hypothetical countries is not a solution. That is why we are always taught moderation. Yet, what-has-happened will tell us that the most creative people did belong to one or both of the above hypothetical countries (at least when people were at their creative best, do hell with it!!). In the above story, laughter can be substituted by hysteria, and I may start making sense a bit more.
Can we moderate the levels of emotions to a degree that we retain more spontaneity? It will mean less thinking, more doing, thinking will be spontaneous, works or doesn’t-work will be split second decision, lots of heuristics, so much of it that the scope of general rules people will know will be very-very large. Creativity no longer will be a thing which will be taught. I think the art-instinct quotient which is thought to be hardwired into us, will definitely grow.
Spontaneity may also mean less calculations based on past, less biases if I can say that.
It seems I have mistaken extreme emotions for spontaneity, does being spontaneous means we present extreme emotions? Does “being extreme” means we are spontaneous? One can argue about that, but definitely smells like some concoction happening there.
Would like to touch more on controlled environments here, but my spontaneity is giving way to lack of solid knowledge—plain truth is never discovered, but failed attempt at discovery is a step closer to actual discovery.