One of the reasons that attempts to depict emotion as something that can be objectively determined are inherently flawed is that emotions take on different meanings depending upon the perspective from which they are examined. Morbid feelings are one example of this, as people who declare others feeling morbid typically declare the emotion to be excessive and intolerable, while those exploring the depths of morbid sensations report discovering powerful philosophical insights that ennoble their lives.
The meaning of mischievous emotion is the subject of a similar kind of conflict. Dictionary definitions of what it means to be mischievous tend to be judgmental, declaring mischief to be harmful, troublesome, and annoying. When people declare themselves to be feeling mischievous, however, they emphasize something more in the pursuit of fun.
The mischievous certainly aim to cause trouble, but they don’t aim to cause serious harm to others. A mischievous person becomes a trickster with the aim of a kind of playful rebellion against those who, like dictionary editors, place themselves in roles of stiff self-importance.
Mischief disrupts the plans of those who aspire to manage everyone else’s lives down to the smallest detail. That’s the same thing that emotion does to reason. To the rational mind, the mischievous is an unacceptable violation, but who gave rationality the power to lay down the law, to outlaw freedom of emotion? To be mischievous is to be a conscientious objector.
