The 50th Law (with 50 Cent)

Step Two: Beware the Inflaming Factors
Low-grade emotions continually affect our thinking, and they originate
from our own impulses—for instance, the desire for pleasing and
comforting thoughts. High-grade emotion, however, comes at certain
moments, reaches an explosive pitch, and is generally sparked by
something external—a person who gets under our skin, or particular
circumstances. The level of arousal is higher and our attention is
captured completely. The more we think about the emotion, the
stronger it gets, which makes us focus even more on it, and so on and
so forth. Our minds tunnel into the emotion, and everything reminds
us of our anger or excitement. We become reactive. Because we are
unable to bear the tension this brings, high-grade emotion usually
culminates in some rash action with disastrous consequences. In the

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middle of such an attack we feel possessed, as if a second, limbic self
has taken over.
It is best to be aware of these factors so that you can stop the mind
from tunneling and prevent the releasing action that you will always
come to regret. You should also be aware of high-grade irrationality in
others, to either get out of their way or help bring them back to reality.
Trigger Points from Early Childhood
In early childhood we were at our most sensitive and vulnerable. Our
relationship to our parents had a much greater impact on us the
further back in time we go. The same could be said for any early
powerful experience. These vulnerabilities and wounds remain buried
deep within our minds. Sometimes we try to repress the memory of
these influences, if they happen to be negative—great fears or
humiliations. Sometimes, however, they are associated with positive
emotions, experiences of love and attention that we continually want to
relive. Later in life, a person or event will trigger a memory of this
positive or negative experience, and with it a release of powerful
chemicals or hormones associated with the memory.
Take, for example, a young man who had a distant, narcissistic
mother. As an infant or child, he experienced her coldness as
abandonment, and to be abandoned must mean he was somehow
unworthy of her love. Or similarly, a new sibling on the scene caused
his mother to give him much less attention, which he equally
experienced as abandonment. Later in life, in a relationship, a woman
might hint at disapproval of some trait or action of his, all of which is