57. |
Take Charge of Your Emotions |
How many times have we all said things like, “So-and-so makes me angry,” or, “When this or that happens it makes me mad”?
Are these statements true?
I’d like you to try a little experiment. First, think about the worst day you’ve ever had at work. Perhaps it was the day your boss embarrassed you in front of the group. Maybe it was the day you make a huge mistake, costing the company a small fortune. Recall what happened, who was there, what was said, and all the details you can. In your mind, put yourself back in the scene, feeling and experiencing it as though it were actually happening.
Now how do you feel?
I’m going to guess you feel pretty lousy recalling this day you would just as soon forget.
Next, I’d like you to recall your best, most amazing day. What was that like? What were you doing? Replay this scene in your mind, feeling and experiencing it in as much detail as you can. Hear the sounds that were there in the moment; smell the smells. Really immerse yourself in the feelings you had on that fantastic day.
Now how do you feel?
This time I’m going to take a wild guess and say you feel pretty amazing or at least really, really good.
Okay. What did we just learn?
You were able to switch from feeling poorly, maybe even depressed, to feeling great. You did all this with your thoughts or, more accurately, with what you were telling yourself. The scenes were not actually taking place, and there was no one there to affect how you felt.
If you ask people why they are not happier you will typically hear a litany of reasons that, most likely, involve blaming people and circumstances for how they feel when, in reality, how they feel is totally within their control.
You choose how you feel in response to whatever is taking place around you. At any time you can choose to feel better simply by changing what you’re focused on in the moment.
This is one of the reasons I suggest you limit the amount of news you watch and if you must watch or read the news, try not to become emotionally invested in it. Overidentifying with stories in the news will cause you to change your emotional state as quickly as you just did in the exercise above. Understand that it is you and your emotional response to what you’re watching or reading that is creating your unhappiness.
The good news is that you can change it in a moment simply by changing what you place your attention on. If you read stories of people who have endured horrors and managed to come through emotionally intact, you will find that they devised ways to reframe their circumstances. They internally represented what was happening in a different way than those who did not fare as well. In effect, they took charge of their internal communication and, thus, their emotions.
There it is! When you learn to take charge of your thoughts, which determine how you feel, you become master of your mind and are able to choose how you respond in any circumstance.
When you find yourself going into a negative spiral, stop your train of thought. Just interrupt your thinking and ask, “What thought could I think, right now, that would feel just a little bit better than what I’m thinking?” If need be, reframe the situation by asking something like, “What’s good about this?” Little by little you will begin to feel better as you change your focus and raise your emotional state.