Our emotions are involuntary responses to the stimuli that we encounter in the world. When the emotions are voluntary, in the sense that we decide to feel a certain emotion and showcase it, then that's labeled 'faking it'. 

We can train ourselves to feel a certain way when we encounter certain stimuli. That's the grey area between voluntary and involuntary emotions. At the moment when we encounter the stimuli, we still feel emotions in an involuntary way. But since we have been training, we handle these emotions in a voluntary way in terms of how we express them and how we let them affect our consequent actions. 

This is the grey area in which professionals excel in. 

To be a professional is to bring a consistent level of effort and performance irrespective of the emotive state we find ourselves in. 

However, to be a good professional is to also learn from the emotions we feel and to use them to our advantage. 

After all, emotions are data points that we should utilise to experience our world better. 

I've done this in the past to help schedule blocks of time for different types of work to maximise my energy through the day. 

But, at the time of the start of a new year, which is a time for reflection as well as looking forward into the next year, observing our emotions is a good way to determine what is important to us and what isn't and to reset our routines in a way that we will enjoy more and in a way that will help us achieve more. 

Reflection is not just on how and what we have done or achieved, but also on how we have felt doing the various things that we have done.