Are my decisions really driven by logic or by emotion?

Rabbi Landau teaches that every decision you have ever made was emotional. “The logic came after to explain what your heart already decided.”

Who to marry, what job to take, who to trust, who to cut off: all of it was felt first and justified afterward. The smarter you are, the more airtight the logic sounds. “But the sequence never changes. Emotions first and logic second, every single time.”

King Solomon said it: “Lev choresh machshavos,” the heart plows the thoughts. It is the heart that plows, not the brain, and the logic just follows.

The goal isn't to stop feeling, he explains. It is to catch yourself in the moment between the emotion and the logical story you build around it, and ask: “Is this actually true? Or is it my heart dressed up with logic?” “You are not logical. You are emotional with good explanations. Knowing that is actually the beginning of thinking.”

Going deeper: Rabbi Landau's teaching, level by level

Surface claim

Feeling comes first. Logic follows to explain it.

Fear, vulnerability, or tension

The smarter a person is, the more convincing his explanations, and so the harder they are to suspect.

What may be behind it

In A Soul at Peace, Rabbi Landau writes that a plowman adds nothing from outside; he uncovers what is already in the soil. The heart cuts the furrow, and the mind travels along it.

Deepest human truth

Admitting “I am an emotional person with good explanations” is not self-blame. It is the starting point of real inner work.

More questions from this teaching

• How can I tell if I'm just rationalizing a decision?