Heart over Mind

“Someday, when someone else’s arms are around us
When time has put some distance between us
The years will kindly show
How mem’ries come and go
They ebb and flow, like the tides” - Barbara Streisand, “Places That belong to You”

Neuroscientists at the University of Sheffield posit that “the part of the brain practicing empathy is not the same part that assesses forgivability of an offense.” What does this imply?

All our ethical values shaped by philosophy and religion might be less influential as we have previously assumed. With this finding, it appears that the brain decodes by itself and makes its own neurological distinctions. Interesting.

Does this in any way explain why we can eventually forgive people who schooled us in betrayal, infidelity, and fraud yet we can’t go past the persons who didn’t reciprocate our affections, those who played dead to our overtures?

A classmate F is friends with all his now-Insignificant Others but is scornful of any mention of J, the girl who didn’t give him the time of day, fancying somebody else. What’s one honest snub to a string of insincere compliments and exhausting placations of a jealous heart he was subjected to by his numerous girlfriends? Isn’t forgiveness proportional to the severity of an offense? I can’t understand why it’s easier to deal with an ex playing footsie with another guy than extending a handshake to someone who doesn’t fit in the category of either past or future whatever.

Are some people easier to forgive than others? Is it because of who and what they represented at one point in our lives? Me thinks people we genuinely like can do nothing wrong – their abrasiveness, I call candor; their atrocity, I call mischief.

Take the case of Joey de Leon, my favorite rascal, whose Barbie and Starzan series are considered by my HS male classmates the pinnacle of Pinoy movie craftsmanship. Long before that, the Escalera brothers’ musical antics were my nursery tunes, courtesy of our neighbor’s extensive vinyl collection. So when JDL takes potshots at “Wowowee,” for example, there’s nothing to forgive because golly-goo, he’s the man.

We are tolerant and forgiving of people we don’t dislike. El Duque once berated me for carrying a Vaclav Havel book around, his contempt palpable, “You’re reading him? He’s anti-communist.” Another friend reproaches my Coetzee-fascination, “I don’t believe you admire someone who never spoke out against apartheid.”

In a different circumstance, these unsavory remarks might have been met with a combative repartee but since they’re not mouthed by people you dislike, everything is placed under the rug, Matutina-style.

Maximum or minimum tolerance is a capricious practice, depending on the like-dislike factor, I guess. In Philippine showbiz, I can exercise maximum tolerance to Lolit Solis but zero-nil-zilch for Annabelle Rama. What’s the equalizer?

Neuroscientists might be wrong, after all. It’s not the brain that decodes and rules, it’s the heart. More likely, you can bet my pwet.

Advice to the Young at Heart

“Batang-bata ka pa at marami ka pang kailangang intindihin sa mundo” - Apo Hiking Society, “Batang-Bata"

Some of my batchmates are already parents to college freshmen, wow. Where did I waste my time, hmm? To my unborn children, these tips whose usefulness you reserve judgment on for later:

01. Never fear ideas. Suspect people who do but always be respectful of contrary ideas.

02. Walk unafraid. Do not strive for balance, welcome tensions and doubts.

03. Always be on the side of justice. Be uncompromising in your principles but never be dogmatic.

04. Don’t belabor too much on getting answers instantly. There is more beauty in the question.

05. Share what you have without expecting something in return.

06. Show courtesy especially to those who don’t deserve it.

07. Read, read till you go blind. No minute is ever wasted with a book as a companion. Reading is the cheapest way to travel – it’s like going to another country or learning a new language.

08. “Rage, rage against the dying of the light,” says Dylan Thomas. U2 seconds the motion, “Kick the darkness till it bleeds daylight.” Be warned however, that those who strive to see the light must endure the pain of burning.

09. Celebrate life. Don’t devalue life with your indifference and lack of concern.

10. Love, love without quarters; love with no ifs and buts. Waray karag-sukli, waray karag-bawi, waray karag-basul.