This is an excerpt from a book I am writing. I think it ties into what gaylubeoil posted about "The Real"

I often hear the rallying cries “You can’t change anyone!” This is 100% correct. No one, under any circumstance, can forcefully change a person. This is because a person cannot change how another thinks. Only the individual has control over their thoughts. I am sure in the future there will be some mind control device readily available to the highest bidder, but as of now the statement stands. Alright, so I can’t change anyone, no one can change me. Then why, when people say things, do so many people get so upset?

Emotions and thoughts are processes that occur in the brain. I talk, vibrations go through the air, they enter another person’s ear holes, the vibration gets translated to a signal, signal goes to the brain, and the brain processes it. I try to tell someone not to jump off a cliff because his life can get better, she is just a girl, he will find another one. He says he is going to do it anyways. He loves her or whatever and I can’t change that, check. I then tell the same guy to go ahead and do it. I tell him if I were his father, I would be ashamed of him if he were my son. I tell him his father is a great man and the thought of producing a son like him makes me not want to have kids. He gets upset and defensive then jumps. Wow, I am a terrible person for saying such awful things. Maybe, but the fact remains NOTHING physically changed in the interaction we had. My mouth to the air, the air to his ears, his ears to his brain, but it is different this time. I couldn’t change his love for her, or his decision to jump, but I can make him more sad and force him to jump. That is 100% on him. Attempt to rationalize your own personal justification about why it is still the other person’s fault when they say something you don’t like.