According to physiology the intense emotions are shown to raise blood pressure. This increase in blood pressure is associated with activation of the sympathetic nervous system (fight or flight). High blood pressure whether by association or cause is linked to poor health in the form of increased risk of heart attacks and strokes.
What are the costs of experiencing intense emotions?
On one hand the intense emotions act as a source of motivation. A person who truly does not care about anything will not be motivated. A person who hates to lose will be motivated to win. A person who loves something will be much more motivated to take care of it. Of course these are the positive examples of intense emotions and even these positive examples can result in negative outcomes for the individual experiencing these emotions depending on how they channel their emotional fuel.
In my opinion the way to intelligently channel emotional fuel requires quite a bit of wisdom. In my opinion it requires more wisdom than a mere individual is likely to have which is why it matters a lot that an individual who has intense emotions be surrounded by the right people and be in an environment where their emotions can be safely and usefully experienced and expressed. Unfortunately not all people are lucky enough to be in the right environments and many are brought up even as children in very deranged environments which may in fact be toxic for people with intense emotions (in other words the more they care in a hopeless environment the worse it can be).
In an encouraging environment there are safe outlets for the emotions to be experienced and expressed. For example people who are angry, aggressive or competitive, might want to compete as a way to express how they feel. For these purposes an environment where organized competitions and safe forms of combat can be encouraged. Examples include combat sports such as boxing, wrestling, track and field, weight lifting, but also intellectually competitions such as games. These outlets allow aggression to be released in a socially acceptable and safe manner, and this is in my opinion one of the reasons why video games are popular. The more experience a person has with experiencing different emotions during their youth the better they can be at managing those emotions later on when they experience them as an adult.
What impact do drugs like SSRIs have on the emotional spectrum?
The United States in particular has a trend of depression and anxiety. My current hypothesis is that these psychological trends are not based on anything scientific but are cultural. In my opinion the definition of depression and to a lesser extend anxiety, are based entirely on how the society and it's culture interpret certain behaviors. A depressed person in the United States might be normal in another part of the world which could explain why depression is so commonly diagnosed in the United States (cultural expectations on personality). Note, depression is not the same as sadness, and not everyone depressed thinks of themselves as "unhapppy", as it's more nuanced and is considered a "mood disorder".
My understanding of psychology is that disorder is generally based on what the normal mood in the society is and not necessarily based on anything concrete. The Wikipedia definition of mental disorder:
> A mental disorder, also called a mental illness[2] or psychiatric disorder, is a behavioral or mental pattern that causes significant distress or impairment of personal functioning.[3]
Impairment is generally assessed by observation of another. If the psychiatrist or psychologist from a particular culture and social class considers a certain mental or behavioral pattern an impairment we have to also consider this in context. There is no universal mental or behavioral pattern which works well in every society, in every culture, all the time. People generally adapt mentally to the environment and culture they are in but some people who do not adapt as well may be considered disordered.
I think it is important to note that ttthere is no culturally neutral w2ay to define "mental disorder" as in one culture (an atheist culture) a religious person could be considered "mentally ill" while in a religious culture maybe the atheist person could be considered "mentally ill". In these instances there is no objective way to measure, but in the definition there is also the key phrase of "significant distress"... How do we measure this distress and at what threshold does it become significant? In cases of self harm or harming others it is clearly obvious but this threshold is not required to be diagnosed with depression.
What impact do SSRIs have on mood? Some who have been prescribed these drugs say SSRIs dull the emotional spectrum. Clearly SSRIs have some impact because they do cause changes in behavior but how do we know these changes are good for the individual? If the individual is not suffering as much while on this treatment then clearly it has the benefit of relief of suffering, but does this relief of suffering impact motivation?
Also is it all based on cultural assumptions or is it based on outcome studies? Since SSRIs are prescribed to nearly 13% of the US population for a lot more than just depression, we have to consider what SSRIs actually do. Unfortunately I can't find high quality information on life outcomes of people who take SSRIs, and the chemical imbalance theory of depression I find dubious as there is no clear evidence that 13% of the US population over 12 has such a chemical imbalance.
Stress management
In my current opinion stress management is a skill which people learn. Experiencing different emotions is a means of learning the skill at how to manage the emotions and their impact on physiology. There is the exceptions where some people self harm, or lose self control, and in these exceptional cases maybe additional help is required. At the same time I think stress management is a skill people are not really taught in some cultures and some societies are more stressful culturally than others. The United Starts in particular as a society embraces a lot of fear, a lot of anger, a lot of these triggers are all over the media, and this culture of fear and anger could generate some of the depression and anxiety many Americans legitimately feel. The point is that the culture creates the mind, and if the minds of a society are depressed and anxious, it may say something about trends in that particular society.
Stress management if it is important within a society will be encouraged. for example in the United States caffeine, sugar, and other stimulants are favored. These stimulants are known to increase blood pressure, increase anxiety, etc. It is also the case that in the United States a lot of emphasis is put on being "on time", which is not true in some other parts of the world. The need to live by the clock creates additional anxiety which might not exist in some parts of Asia. We know in France for example people live life at a slower pace than in for example the United States or Japan.
In my opinion stress management includes finding high quality emotional outlets, as well as adjustments to diet, as well as sleep optimization, exercises, nutritional supplements, testosterone replacement, and many other techniques. Emotional outlets can simply be to have enough games so that emotional energy can be safely released or channeled when it builds up. These games can be in the real world, or be video games, but these outlets have to exist for people. Adjusting the diet to the stress level is also important because a bad diet increases physiological stress which cannot be distinguished from emotional stress by the body. The sleep optimization techniques include having a quite place to sleep or ways to create quiet using white noise, ear plugs, having a way to block blue light, having a way to block the impact of electronics which could affect sleep quality, having the ability to block for example EMF or radiation, and learning how to boost recovery by meditation and microsleep. Exercise in the right dose improves stress resilience, due to better blood circulation, faster recovery, lower blood pressure, and it is shown in studies exercise reduces and prevents depression as effectively as SSRIs.
Nutritional supplements have been shown to block the effects of radiation, such as with antioxidants, and there are also supplements which reduce stress, but again there is more studies to be had here and it's hit or miss with supplements. Testosterone replacement has been shown to help men in particular conquer depression, as men who enter their 30s and 40s see a dramatic drop in testosterone which in some men could cause the symptoms of depression and anxiety, but again this is something up for debate.
My current conclusion is that stress management techniques are under appreciated and not often discussed. Meditation, active recovery, sleep optimization, supplements, nutritional efficiency and optimization of diet, and testosterone replacement. The effects of aging cannot be stopped and physiological changes will happen. The ability of an individual to handle stress goes down with age as their body becomes more fragile to disruption. In men testosterone goes down, sleep quality in men and women goes down as they age, and the only way to counter this is to develop skills to compensate for these changes.
References
https://www.psychiatrictimes.com/articles/significance-clinical-significance
Locher, C., Koechlin, H., Zion, S. R., Werner, C., Pine, D. S., Kirsch, I., ... & Kossowsky, J. (2017). Efficacy and safety of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors, and placebo for common psychiatric disorders among children and adolescents: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Jama Psychiatry, 74(10), 1011-1020.