Basic emotions of Beth Harmon. Which emotions does she experience most often, and which ones of them help her to achieve her goals?

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Reeve (2009) provides a list of 6 basic emotions: fear, anger, disgust, sadness, joy, and interest. In this post, I am going to look at which of these emotions are commonly experienced by Beth Harmon and which of them help her to succeed.

Fear

"Fear is an emotional reaction that arises from a person's interpretation that the situation he or she faces is dangerous and a threat to one's well-being" (Reeve, 2009, p. 313).

Beth has very little fear (or at least she makes us believe so). In the beginning of one of the episodes, we hear her mother's voice talking to little Beth. Here are her words: "Dark is nothing to be afraid of. In fact, I'd go as far as saying there's nothing to be afraid of. Anywhere. The strongest person is the person who isn't scared to be alone. It's other people you got to worry about... Someday, you're gonna be all alone, so you need to figure out how to take care of yourself." It looks like Beth is following her mother's advice very carefully. The only time she acknowledges that she fears someone is when she has the following conversation with her adoptive mother, Alma. "I don't suppose there is anyone you're afraid of," – says Alma. "There is one player that scares me. The Russian Borgov," – responds Beth. That is the only time Beth explicitly talk about her fears.

However, we could infer that Beth has fears. She is scared as a little girl, when her mother kills herself. She is scared after her adoptive mother dies. She is scared when she loses to Borgov. But she always has someone by her side who helps her to adapt to new circumstances. In the first case, it is Mr. Shaibel, her new friend Jolene, and other caring people from the orphanage. In the second case, it's Harry Beltik who comes to stay with her. In the third case, it's all her friends who prepare her for the most important game of her life.

Anger

"The essence of anger is the belief that the situation is not what it should be; that is the restraint, interference, or criticism is illegitimate" (Reeve, 2009, p. 313).

I would say that anger is the emotion which is experienced by Beth more often than any other emotions. This  is something Beth is struggling with all the time. It is Mr. Shaibel who points out her weakness first. "People like you have a hard time. Two sides of the same coin. You've got your gift and you've got what it costs. You've got so much anger in you. You'll have to be careful." "Let's play," – this is Beth's response. 

Another person who points this weakness out is Harry Beltik. At some point, they have the following exchange.

– You're stubborn, so you get mad. When that happens, you can only see what's in front of you.

– Anger clears my head.

– Anger is a potent spice. A pinch wakes you up, too much dulls your senses. You've got to stay open if you get locked into one idea, it's death.

Reeve (2009) argues that anger can be productive. "Anger is productive when it energizes vigor, strength, and endurance in our efforts to cope productively..." (Reeve, 2009, p. 314). Indeed, anger makes Beth act more decisively and come up with new strategies. However, it also prevents her from being more open and creative. This is what Harry is talking about.

Anger is Beth's strength, but it is also her weakness. She refuses to face it for a long time and overcomes it only at the very end of the show when she plays the game of her life against Borgov.

Disgust

"Disgust involves getting rid of or getting away from a contaminated, deteriorated, or spoiled object" (Reeve, 2009, p. 314).

When Beth gets sad or angry she escapes in the world of various addictive substances. It seems like she has to go through these stages to be able to get no a new level. Sometimes she copes with her addictions by herself, but usually she has a caring person who helps her out. Her friends are always looking after her and don't let her go too far.

Sadness

"Sadness arises principally from experiences of separation and failure" (Reeve, 2009, p. 315).

Sadness is another emotion which Beth experiences quite often. She is often forced to get separated from the closest people: her mother, her mentor, her adoptive mother, her friends. Interestingly, she doesn't get sad if she fails in something. Well, she doesn't fail often. But if she does, she gets angry. Only separation from the dearest people make her sad. When Beth is sad, she usually escapes in the world of chess or addictive substances.

Joy

"Joy is emotional evidence that things are going well" (Reeve, 2009, p. 316).

Joy is not an emotion that I would associate with Beth. There are very few truthfully joyful moments in the series. Beth can be joyful with her friends or with her adoptive mother, when they have a nice conversation or share nice experiences. However, most of the time Beth doesn't let herself be joyful. She constantly occupies herself with work. It might be that she realizes how fragile the joyful moments are she is also afraid of losing these people, so she doesn't let herself relax and enjoy happy times.

Interest

"Interest creates the desire to explore, investigate, seek out, manipulate, and extract information from the objects that surround us" (Reeve, 2009, p. 317).

Interest is truly an emotion which helps Beth move forward. This is how her passion for chess begins. She sees the custodian playing chess with himself in the basement and gets mesmerized by this game. Beth is very curious and she is not afraid of asking questions. She is always ready to learn. "Let's play a game," "How do I get a rating?" "I want to play the best," "What's in Las Vegas?" "What's in Moscow?" Beth is always interested in what is going on and she wants to get involved. She always anticipates the next step and want to know how to prepare for it.

As it is noted in Reeve (2009), "interest... enhances learning" (Alexander et al., 1994, as cited in Reeve, 2009, p. 317). Beth Harmon is a great example how being curious and persistent can help us to master our goals and be successful. Beth is an amazing learner who always seeking for new ways to improve her performance.

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For Beth Harmon, anger and interest are the most frequently experienced emotions. Emotions help us to adapt to changing circumstances and move forward. They help us to find new strategies and move away from the ones which don't work for us. For Beth, these emotions are anger and interest. Interest pushes her towards learning new strategies and mastering her skills. Anger gives her energy and strength to do that. This is her unique recipe for success.

References

Reeve, J. (2009). Understanding motivation and emotion (5th ed.). Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.