Emotion

Because Disneyland is clearly designed to be an emotional experience, one of the biggest shifts I experienced from spending a full 30 days there was to reassess my own relationship with emotion. When I saw how Disney deftly manipulated emotion like the puppeteer at the beginning of the Pinocchio ride, I began paying more attention to my own emotions and how Disney was trying to trigger me to feel a certain way.

This was like a form of meditation, but instead of observing my thoughts, I observed my feelings and the triggers that gave rise to them. The more I observed my feelings, the less they seemed to influence my behavior.

For instance, it was fun for a while to keep raising my Astro Blasters score. My personal best during the 30 days was 984,500. But after a while I stopped caring, and it didn’t matter what my score was. One time I put the gun down and didn’t bother shooting after a while. I just observed the other players instead.

On our last night there, we watched the World of Color light and fountain show. I watched the various Disney characters flashing by in animated scenes with booming Disney music. I saw the giant Mickey Mouse behind the water, probably placed there deliberately to help people associate these emotions with one of Disney’s most recognized brands. But mostly I observed the crowd. I watched and listened as people oohed and aahed. And I thought, Wow… Disney really owns these people. The level of submission is impressive.