Removing Emotion from Decision Making

This was a response to a client that, after writing, I realized might serve as a good lesson for some of the younger folk out there who've been fed lies and bullshit their entire lives before they enter the real world:

OK, there's how I personally separate emotions from my decisions, and then there's how I'd recommend doing it.  Explaining my journey towards "emotionless decision making" this is the route:

One, it wasn't a choice.  If you are brought up under reasonable wealth, or at least have parents (or the government) willing to finance/lend you money, you can live in lala land where your emotions can temporarily rule your decisions for quite some time.  Shit, you see this with middle aged women who live until they lose their looks thinking they're the greatest thing ever because of "themselves" and not because they're young and guys want to bang them.  So in my particular case my poverty made the real world REALLY apparent to me early on.  I coudlnt' afford bars or night clubs or time pursuing stupid shit (girls, liberal arts degrees, etc) because such a waste of resources would result in a week without food, no gas, etc.  It was hard and crushing (and I remember it to this day), but there was a night where I realized what I was facing in the real world, and it was depressing.

Still, living in the harsh real world, is better than living in la la land, especially the long run.  My one night or anger and rage is infinintely better than 30 years of post-menopausal delusion cat ladies go through before they die still thinking "big is beautiful."

Two, this then led to having my dreams crushed and accepting what the real world was.  So once this happens, emotions are removed from any decision making.  You replace your unattainable dreams with real world goals. And you don't think "wouldn't it be nice or fun to attain these goals," but you look at the world in a cold, scientific, and calculating manner and figure out how to attain those goals in the most efficient and expeditious manner because your life and survival depends on it.

Three, this inevitably leads towards you becoming an adult real quick and quickly develops a hatred for the poppy cock, Oprah's pretty lies bullshit.  THis also leads towards a complete disdain, if not outright hatred of the sheeple and morons around you.  I truly don't know who I hate more.  People who are purposely evil, or the sheep who swallow every line of bullshit from politicians, talking heads, media, Hollywood, professors, parents, etc., and then have the gall to think themselves more noble and moral than you.  Regardless, only further reinforces removing emotion from decision making, perhaps replacing hatred and vengeance in where there once was hope.  But it also turns you into a machiavellian where you're often tempted to just become a charlatan yourself and legally extort as much as you can from your fellow man (for example Asshole Consulting is an INCREDIBLY RARE blessing where being truthful actually helps people morally.  If this were to ever go away nearly all my plans are to lie to the dupes and rubes of society and make as much bank on telling them pretty lies).

Finally, it inevitably just becomes a simple, conscious choice.  Even a principle you live by.  "Am I going to live in the real world or let my feelings and emotions get in the way?"  Seriously, any intellectually honest man or woman can ask themselves this simple question and answer it correctly, and that's how I'd recommend most people remove emotions from decision making.  You simply ask yourself:

Does making decisions in the real world or emotional delusion result in better long term results?

However, while it's intellectually easy to answer this question, it's getting rid of the emotional pain that comes with doing what is sane, empirical, and right that's the trick.  Fortunately, over time, the real world will punish you, making it more painful to make emotional decisions than logical rational ones. Men typically get to face the full costs and consequences of their decisions earlier in life because society won't shield them from the cost of their mistakes.  So we learn quickly.  But as Bill Burr famously said, "Women keep patting themselves on their back, thinking they're great when nobody corrects them because we want to fuck 'em."  And this permits women to temporarily live in lala land, making emotional decisions more frequently and longer into life.  But, still, sooner or later, the real world will punish you for making decisions based on emotion and not reality, and that pain will inevitably remove all emotion from your decision making...whether you like it or not

Anyway, hope that helped.

Aaron