DiotimosReading Desk

Mental life and practical action

Emotion and mood

emotion; emotions; mood; moods; feelings

Emotion and mood name the changing mental conditions that the practical teaching seeks to understand and influence.

From the book

The Kybalion

Three Initiates · Diotimos Editions · 2026

Browse this book’s lexicon →

Orientation

At a Glance

  • The wordEmotion and mood name the changing mental conditions that the practical teaching seeks to understand and influence.
  • In The KybalionIX claims that each mental state has a corresponding rate and mode of vibration.
  • In this editionThe several source words are retained rather than standardized into mood.
  • A place to readIX.10: … “science. They teach that all manifestation of thought, emotion, reason, will or desire, or any mental” …

Meaning

Emotion and mood name the changing mental conditions that the practical teaching seeks to understand and influence. They are experienced states, but the book further describes them as positions on polar and vibrational scales.

Use in the book

IX claims that each mental state has a corresponding rate and mode of vibration. X proposes that opposed states can be changed along the same kind of scale. XI describes their succession as a rhythmic swing, especially between enthusiasm and depression or courage and fear.

XIV asks the pupil to distinguish the self from the mental states it notices. XV joins these ideas into a method: direct attention toward the desired state, polarize, and become less carried away by alternation.

Places to read

  1. IX Vibration · Block 10… “science. They teach that all manifestation of thought, emotion, reason, will or desire, or any mental state or condition, are accompanied by vibrations, a portion of which are thrown off and” …
  2. IX Vibration · Block 11“Every thought, emotion or mental state has its corresponding rate and mode of vibration. And by an effort of the will of the person, or of other persons, these mental states” …
  3. XI Rhythm · Block 6… “that it accounts for the bewildering succession of moods, feelings and other annoying and perplexing changes that we notice in ourselves. But the Hermetists by studying the operations of this Principle” …
  4. XI Rhythm · Block 8… “any thinking person who realizes what creatures of moods, feelings and emotion the majority of people are, and how little mastery of themselves they manifest. If you will stop and consider” …
  5. XIV Mental Gender · Block 7… “identify the "Me" entirely with the mental states, feelings, etc., which he feels to exist within him. He is very apt to consider these internal states as identical with himself, instead” …
  6. XV Hermetic Axioms · Block 4“"To change your mood or mental state—change your vibration."—The Kybalion.”

In this edition

The several source words are retained rather than standardized into mood. Their overlap is explained without inventing a strict taxonomy the book does not supply.

Reading the argument

The text's illustrations simplify emotional life into paired directions. A mood may also involve several feelings, interpretations, and conditions at once. Recognizing that simplification helps distinguish an accessible practice of attention from the stronger universal law claimed for it.

emotion

“emotion” — 5 occurrences in 5 text blocks: IX.10–11; XI.8; XII.11; XV.11.

emotions

“emotions” — 9 occurrences in 9 text blocks: IV.8; VIII.18; X.11; XII.11; XIV.5, 7–8; XV.11, 14.

mood

“mood” — 4 occurrences in 4 text blocks: XI.8; XII.11; XV.4, 11.

moods

“moods” — 17 occurrences in 11 text blocks: II.22; IX.11; XI.6–8; XII.11–12; XV.5, 7, 11, 14.

feelings

“feelings” — 16 occurrences in 11 text blocks: IV.8; VIII.18; XI.6–8; XII.11; XIV.5, 7–8; XV.11, 14.