How to manage negative emotions. An example of controversial positive manipulation
Do you often lose your temper in difficult situations? Agree, the inability to control your emotions often interferes with life. Therefore, managing them is very important. Don't know how? We will tell you!
This article is intended for persons over 18 years of age.
Are you over 18 already?
What are emotions?
There are several definitions of the concept of "emotions". Some call this concept the expression with the help of voice and facial movements of emotional experiences. Others are situational manifestations of feelings (short and fast). The third are feelings that are expressed specifically for others. In other words, if we sum up all the definitions, then emotions are expressive movements that carry information about the state of a person and convey his attitude to a particular action or event.
Emotions are of several types:
- positive ones - forgiveness, joy, admiration, pleasure, etc.;
- negative - envy, hatred, anger, anger, irritation, etc.;
- neutral - acquiring different shades in different situations (for example, surprise).
Why is it important to control emotions?
The ability to manage your emotions is very important for any person. First, emotions often arise in the wrong place at the wrong time. Secondly, our emotions can hurt the people around us. Thirdly, if we are overwhelmed with emotions, it will be much more difficult for us to concentrate on something. An excess of emotions makes it difficult to relax and unwind. The ability to manage emotions is a sign of a developed personality and a well-mannered person who is able to control his feelings even in situations where it is very difficult. The ability to manage emotions must be developed. You can do this on your own or with the help of specialists who will give you practical advice.
How to learn to manage your emotions?
More than one book is devoted to the acquisition of emotion management skills. This question is studied by such a science as psychology. We will try to briefly summarize the most basic tips on how you can gain control over yourself.
1. Watch your face.Before the emotion has gained strength, remove it by changing your facial expression to a more neutral one. If you can do this, then the intensity of passions will immediately subside. If this causes you difficulty, then you need to resort to training the skill of calm presence. This skill is one of the most effective and simple ways managing your own feelings. Its essence is as follows: create a list of situations in which your face expresses emotions (grimaces, wrinkles, twitches, etc.). Often this happens in situations where you have to do something unpleasant. Take this domestic situation(e.g. washing dishes) under control and train a calm face. After a couple of weeks, you will start to succeed, and after six months you will develop a corresponding habit. Your face will remain calm in all situations, along with this, your character will also become balanced and calm. Greater effect can be achieved by filming yourself on video. So you can see how you learned to control yourself, and this will inspire you to further training. If you want to teach a child to gain control over himself, it will be enough to give him the command every time: “Stop, stand still for a minute with a smile!”, And in a minute you will see the result.
2. Watch your breath.Your emotional state will immediately change if you change the rhythm and frequency of breathing. If you need to raise your energy, it is enough to do exercises accompanied by sharp and strong exhalations. If you need to calm down, start taking calm breaths in and out.
3. Learn to control your thoughts, as they tend to control our attention. If you think about the positive aspects of life, then you trigger positive emotions (negative thoughts give rise to negative emotions). Your task is to avoid negative thoughts. You can do this by switching to other, more positive thoughts. To do this, you need to either say positive phrases aloud, or imagine bright positive pictures (for example, beautiful flowers, a rainbow, etc.).
4. Learn to control your mood.The emotions you experience depend on your mood. Therefore, your task is to constantly improve your mood. The easiest way is to choose an action that makes you feel good and do it every time. For example, you improve your mood by walking in the park, in this case, every time your mood deteriorates, go for a walk in the park.
If you approach the issue from the side of mental hygiene, then the following exercises will help you find sustainable joy:
- start taking pictures of your displeased face. You will not like it, and you will subconsciously look for an option on how to make your face happy;
- standing near the mirror, repeat the phrase ten times: "What a bad mood I have." As a rule, after the fifth repetition, a smile appears, and the mood becomes much better;
- if you are overcome by negative emotions and you are in the grip of a bad mood, smile as widely as possible and keep this smile for a while. You will immediately feel the negative emotions recede;
- laugh sharply - the mood will immediately improve;
- distract yourself from negative thoughts by turning your attention to positive moments;
- mentally talk to yourself, asking questions: “Why do I need this emotion? What are the benefits of this emotion? Is it possible to respond to the situation in a different way? In a dialogue with yourself, negative emotions will leave you;
- recharge with the emotions of other people - a smile will cause a return smile;
- use chromotherapy and aromatherapy. Surround yourself with bright color pictures that enhance your mood, your favorite smells;
- know thyself. The more you know yourself, the better you will learn to control your emotions and your mood. Try to talk more with friends and relatives about your feelings, then over time you will learn to determine exactly which emotion owns you at a given time, and you will control it;
- use self motivation. Determine those goals that will move you forward, give you the strength to overcome negative emotions, control your emotions;
- tune in to the positive. Take a simpler attitude to any life situation and try to see something good in each, even the most difficult of them;
- avoid negativity. Choose your emotions yourself and do not let anyone influence them;
- learn to let go. In the life of every person there is a sufficient number of events that leave an unpleasant aftertaste. Let go of these situations, get rid of the burden that prevents you from moving forward;
- read books. Reading books, you get a lot of impressions and positive emotions. The book helps fight bad mood and depression, helps to achieve inner harmony;
- Pick a hobby or passion you like. Then you won't have time for negativity, that's all. free time will be dedicated to your favorite business;
- change the environment. Take a break from events and people that cause you negative emotions and recharge with positive impressions.
Why is it important to know how to manage your emotions and feelings?
Strong emotions can add bright colors to your life, but at the same time they can destroy your health and psyche. Negative emotions dull your sensitivity to other people and contribute to the destruction of relationships with others. All your energy resources are spent on experiences, which means that you will no longer have enough of them to achieve something significant. For example, negative emotions can hinder your career if you can't control them in a negotiation process.
As for health, negative emotions are the cause of many diseases, both psychological and physical. Therefore, it is very important to prevent neurological reactions by controlling negative emotions in order to avoid sad consequences. People who are under stress for a long time put their health at great risk (psychosomatics). This is especially important for students and schoolchildren during exams. Is the person capable of dealing with this on their own? Yes, definitely. By taking control of your emotions, you will become the master of your life and make it happy and harmonious.
It is not easy to overcome the barriers of mutual understanding that arise in various situations of communication. To do this, you need to be well versed in the nuances. human psychology, including his own. Much easier is not to create these barriers yourself. In order not to be the main obstacle to understanding with others, a person needs to know the psychological rules of communication, and above all, learn to manage their emotions, which most often become a source of interpersonal conflicts.
The value of emotions in human life
For each person, mutual understanding with relatives, friends, colleagues, and indeed with the outside world is important. However, even the closest people have their own special beliefs, character, mood. These differences create barriers to understanding and provoke conflicts in various situations of communication.
Anger, resentment, quarreling - these negative manifestations steal positive investments from the emotional account of trust and can completely devastate it. Uncontrolled emotions can induce a person in the heat of the moment to say too much, to break firewood. Thinking about it, he realizes that he got excited in vain, first he should have weighed everything. Therefore, it is necessary to study the psychological rules of communication, and above all, learn to manage your emotions, which most often become a source of interpersonal conflicts.
Controlling emotions is not about suppressing them. The release of emotions is necessary for a person. It has been proven that the inability to express feelings negatively affects mental and physical health. Old grievances, hidden anger, unshed tears are the psychosomatic causes of many diseases. If a person seeks to maintain external calm at all costs, he runs the risk of becoming seriously ill.
Emotions are an essential mechanism for the body to instantly respond to stress. Fright gives energy to flee from danger; rage activates the muscles and turns off fear; anger sweeps away all obstacles in the way. Under the influence of emotions, there is an instant mobilization of forces, while the mind cannot influence physiological processes to such an extent.
Emotions must be intelligently managed when it is not about survival, but about everyday communication, when violent feelings or apathy interfere with mutual understanding. If from time to time you experience uncontrollable feelings: anger, irritation, resentment, guilt, anxiety, and you wanted to get rid of these destructive emotions, learn to manage your emotional state, master the practical skills of quick recovery and maintaining inner peace of mind in any life situations.
It should be noted that the general distinguishing feature character of centenarians - the ability to find joy in life's little things. This psychological type is characterized by benevolence and lack of hostility to the outside world. Also, a significant advantage of the ability to manage experiences is success in life. Psychologists call the ability of a person to understand and control their emotions, as well as the emotions of others, emotional intelligence (EI). A person with a high level of EI is more likely to become a big businessman, a top manager, an effective politician, since his behavior is more adaptive, which means that he more easily achieves his goals in interaction with others.
Types of emotions
Depending on the intensity, the following types of emotions are distinguished:
- sthenic(from Greek - strength): excite, motivate to vigorous activity (joy, enthusiasm, passion, anger ...). Accompanied by intense action, rapid change in state and a large waste of personal resources.
- asthenic(from Greek - impotence): they slow down, relax, calm or paralyze activity (pain, melancholy, sadness ...). They lead to a decrease in activity, a decrease in the waste of resources and transfer to a state of rest, balance.
Depending on the content, emotions can be of the following types:
- negative(negative): occur when the condition worsens (sadness, anger ...). Motivate the system to perform actions to restore the initial state;
- neutral: occur with a prolonged absence of a change in state (boredom, apathy ...);
- positive(positive): arise when the state improves (joy, happiness ...). They are a supporting factor that motivates the system all the way to the goal until it is achieved.
Depending on the state change, there are the following types of emotions:
- useful: lead to an improvement in the state of the system. In some situations, these can be positive emotions (for example, when you reach a goal), and in others, they can be negative (when an obstacle or danger has arisen).
- harmful: lead to deterioration.
Depending on the degree of influence on activity, the following types of emotions are distinguished:
- simple (basic): are based on one experience (hunger, thirst, danger…). Associated with lower needs (physiological, safety…).
- complex (complex): include several emotions (possibly conflicting) when interacting with a complex system. Associated with higher needs (for communication, self-realization, respect, recognition…).
Depending on the value of the experience, emotions can be of the following types (according to B.I. Dodonova):
- altruistic: arise when helping other systems, supporting them, assisting them in solving problems and achieving goals;
- communicative: when communicating, interacting, exchanging resources;
- gloric: when receiving fame, recognition, fame;
- practical: when achieving success, solving a problem, meeting a need;
- romantic: when perceiving something unknown, unusual, secret, secret;
- glostic: when understanding the meaning of something, learning new things, truth, clarifying knowledge, thoughts, ideas, their systematization;
- aesthetic: when perceiving something beautiful, majestic, sublime, graceful;
- hedonic: with the perception of comfort, coziness, peace, reliable, stable, safe environment;
- active: when collecting something, replenishing the collection, contemplating it;
- mobilization: when overcoming danger, struggle, risk, passion, in extreme situations when active use of physical and intellectual abilities is required.
Is it necessary to control emotions?
You probably know that all people are divided into psychotypes. And, if, for example, extroverts instantly bring down their emotions on another person, acting absolutely thoughtlessly and often to their own detriment, then introverts remain a closed book, hiding all feelings inside. Often people are not even willing to learn how to manage anger, or pacify envy, or control anger, or extinguish anxiety, attributing everything to: “Humble up! That's my character!" Naturally, it is much easier to blame innate data for your problems and difficulties. But don't underestimate the destructive power of negative feelings.
Psychologists have long described what their danger to humans is:
- From simple excitement to a state of affect is not such a long way as it might seem to you at first glance. Just think, you got angry at your husband, who once again threw his socks not in the dirty laundry basket, but under the bed. They wound themselves up and ran to sort things out. And the husband instead of the standard: “Sorry!” grumbled something like: “Take it and put it away yourself, they don’t bother me.” It’s good if everything turns into a banal quarrel, and does not end in crime. Most domestic crimes occur because of the little things.
- The inability to control emotions will lead to problems with others. Even if your parents, friends, husband / wife, colleagues love you very much, sooner or later they will get tired of your imbalance, which means you risk being left alone.
- If you could not immediately cope with a negative emotion and carried it with you for some time, then it left its mark. With each new negative, the trail will begin to increase, and soon you will be surrounded by negative energy, and this muck, as you know, has not brought anything good to anyone yet.
- The inability to control emotions is one of the signs of a person's mental disorders. Yes, yes, as scary as it sounds. It's one thing if you flare up once, but it's quite another if any little thing provokes you to a surge. In this case, it is better to see a specialist.
- Bosses are afraid of people who express their feelings too violently, not only negative, but also positive. No one will entrust the management of a company or the maintenance of an important contract to an unbalanced type, which means that you can forget about a good career.
How to control emotions?
Watch your face. Keep a calm face.
The most important “recipe” is so simple that it even annoys many: “To remove an unnecessary emotion, just remove the wrong face. Fix your eyes and lips. The main thing is to do it right away, while the emotion has not yet unfolded. If you know how to do this, the intensity of emotions will immediately subside. If this is difficult for you, train the skill of calm presence.
Developing the skill of calm presence is one of the easiest and most effective ways emotion management. Indians know how to control their emotions because they know how to keep a calm face. The training of recruits in the army begins with the stand "Attention!" and numerous other procedures and rituals aimed, among other things, at mastering a calm presence. Recruits are ordinary children, it is natural for them to grimace and rattle, so they tend to be afraid, offended and upset. The army teaches them to keep a calm face and through this - to manage their emotions, to be able to maintain self-control and fortitude in the most difficult and responsible situations.
Watch your breath
Changing the strength and rhythm of breathing almost instantly changes the emotional state. If you need to calm down, begin to take a calm breath in and out. When you need to raise energy, it is enough to do energizing exercises. Someone arranges a mini-workout from karate, someone uses special yoga exercises - the essence is the same everywhere: these exercises are accompanied by strong sharp exhalations.
Manage your thoughts
Our thoughts direct our attention. If we pay attention to the bright sides of life, we trigger positive states. If attention is riveted to real or possible troubles with the help of thoughts, then negative arises more often. At the same time, wisdom does not consist in not seeing the difficulties of life, but in treating them constructively: removing the position of the victim and turning problems into tasks.
If negative thoughts go around in circles, they need to be stopped. How? It is best to switch to other, more positive thoughts, and doing this out loud is best for reliability. Talk to yourself out loud - yes, it is sometimes necessary. Other options are to switch yourself to bright, positive pictures - to imagine a rainbow, beautiful flowers ... As a rule, this helps women and children well.
Manage emotions at the level of imagination
The possibilities of our imagination open up a truly large field for action in the field of emotional living. There are many techniques for working with images, such as:
Arrow Catcher Technique
Imagine that catchy remarks, phrases addressed to you are arrows that come from the interlocutor. But you have the advantage of having an invisible back that tends to delay them and let through only the data that is important for position control. However, be careful not to omit information that is critical to making a decision on the issue.
Technique "Second pair of eyes"
Using this technique, you seem to be divided in two and begin to see yourself from the side. Let the events unfolding around you take their course. At the same time, direct part of your attention to observing yourself. Try to understand your reactions, watch what causes them and how they develop. Your inner observer must be impartial and critical. Remember that you need to notice your current actions, states, and correct them in the process. For example: “Conversation with an employee is difficult. I feel like I'm starting to raise my voice, my breathing is getting faster. So, you need to slow down and bring your breathing back to normal. Okay, it's all right now."
Manage emotions on the outer level
Sometimes feelings are so strong that a person needs not only internal resource but also external. In this case, you can crumple or cut sheets of paper into small pieces. If this is not possible due to certain circumstances, start drawing scribbles in a notebook, pressing hard on the rod or stylus. It can also be effective if you do something nice for yourself: drink a cup of delicious coffee / tea, look at pictures of your loved ones, turn on a pleasant melody.
As a preventive work at the level of emotion management, the following measures can be used:
- exercise regularly, visit a massage therapist, do yoga, breathing practices, or any other activity that will meet your emotional needs;
- before the start of each working day or the upcoming difficult conversation, draw in your head the perfect picture of this, tuning in a positive way;
- create comfortable working conditions for yourself. Even if you don't have personal account, coziness can also be created on the desktop: frame a photo of a dear person or beloved pet, pick up stationery with which work will be more enjoyable, choose a mug from which you will enjoy drinking tea / coffee, attach a sticker on the monitor with an encouraging inscription.
So, here are the basic skills that will help you better manage your condition and emotions:
- the ability to divert attention from unnecessary things and direct it to what you want at the moment. This skill will help you switch from negative to positive emotions;
- training your facial expressions and facial expressions. As well as tracking the position of the body, your gestures and the sound of your voice;
- correct breathing. The ability to adjust calm and even breathing. Deep breathing relieves irritation and tension throughout the body;
- controlling your imagination. Learn to immerse yourself in the fantasies and images you create in the moment. This will give you the ability to easily adjust or disconnect from circumstances or situations.
You can also turn to professionals who will teach you special techniques and methods for managing emotions. It will be over effective tool and will give results faster than self-learning. If this is not possible, read books on this topic or watch video tutorials on the Internet. Remember, the one who can control his emotions is the master of the situation.
We are in our Everyday life We are faced with various emotions that we can not always cope with. And this greatly reduces the quality of our lives. More often, these negative emotions "prevent us from living", but there are also situations when positive emotions lead us into undesirable life scenarios. This leads to the fact that we do not manage our lives, but we are carried like a leaf in the wind in an incomprehensible direction, and sometimes just in a circle. As a result, we do not realize all our possibilities and live a life that we do not like.
In order to take the reins of our lives into our own hands, we just need to understand the topic of managing emotions. It is on the basis of our emotions and feelings that we make the lion's share of our decisions, both in personal life, as well as at work. And in this article I will reveal the key points of mastering and managing your internal states.
Each of these moments includes a huge layer of knowledge into which you can dive endlessly. Therefore, in this article I will identify them, and we will examine them in detail in the following articles and also on my YouTube, I have already posted a series of videos on this topic.
Essence of emotions
Modern science has long revealed that every object (including a living organism) has its own radiation, its own field.
Also, we all know that these radiations can greatly affect living organisms (for example, radar radiation can kill birds flying nearby). With the help of antennas, we can catch and reveal these waves and radiations in the form of a television picture or the sound of a radio signal.
The human psyche constantly reads all these waves and at the same time is itself a kind of energy-information field. Modern instruments can measure this field, and the ancient teachings call this field the aura.
Levels of manifestation of emotions: thoughts, feelings, sensations
Our psyche reads and reveals these fields on three levels.
- This is the level of thought. These are pictures, images and sounds that we (just like a TV or radio receiver) can receive and reveal with our head. These images can be associated both with us and with other people. They can reflect our past, present and possible future.
- This is the level of emotions and feelings. Any of our thoughts is always accompanied by some feeling or emotion. We may not always be aware of it, but it is ALWAYS there. It can be fear, anger, regret, despondency, grief, joy, happiness, love, etc.
- This is the level of feeling. Our body always feels these emotions. It can be hot or cold, tingling, pressure, squeezing, pain, swelling, etc. Example: “a mountain fell from my shoulders”, “a lump in my throat”, “a stone in my heart”, my stomach twisted, etc. At the same time, we can feel it both inside our body and outside it.
The essence of emotions is a kind of energy-information clot in our psyche, which we can 1) consider in the form of images and sounds 2) feel it as an emotion or feeling 3) feel it with our body as a physical impact on the body.
And all these three levels are present in our psyche at the same time.
Emotion control mechanisms: attention, awareness and living.
If, for example, you have some obsessive thoughts constantly spinning in your head and you don’t know how to get rid of them, then you can switch your attention to feelings and determine what kind of feeling is behind these thoughts. It may be a fear that you do not admit to yourself. But as soon as you recognize it, realize it and live it, it will let you go and obsessive thoughts will leave you forever.
If you are overcome by any feelings and you do not know what to do with it, then you can switch your attention to your body and answer yourself in which part of the body you experience sensations associated with this feeling. What shape do these sensations have (most often in the form of a ball). What does this feeling look like in composition (something solid, liquid or gaseous).
We most often feel sadness, despondency, regret as some kind of gray cloud somewhere in the body. We can feel chronic pain, humiliation, depression as a compressed hard, black stone. All forms of anger are usually like fire somewhere in the body. Fear is like a gray mist. Judgments and rigid principles can feel like gray metal. Disgust as something green and most often liquid. And the insult is yellow.
By the way, any color has both a positive and a negative emotion. That is, both disgust and love can be green. Yellow as resentment, so joy. But we will never confuse them, we always know for sure this negative or positive feeling.
The experience of hundreds of consultations has shown that almost anyone can perceive all these levels with the help of concentration of attention. And realizing the situation in all its depth and at all levels, a person transforms it.
Awareness is the light that transforms any negative (dark) states. With a certain level of skill, a person can transform l any negative state in a few minutes.
Accommodation
An ordinary person cannot control the emergence of emotions in the psyche. A situation just happens and a certain emotional charge is formed inside us. And then he has two options:
- suppress these emotions inside;
- splash them out.
In the first case, this happens, for example, when a person has a ban on the manifestation of aggression or an unwillingness to show himself weak or a desire to hide fear. This can lead to the fact that, for example, the cup of patience will overflow and anger in the form of fierce, uncontrollable rage will pour out on people. Or if a person has strong internal control, then he will suppress them once and for all in himself. But this energy-informational bunch will not disappear anywhere, it will settle somewhere in the body and will destroy it. Those who are engaged in psychosomatics have already proven that anger leads to a reduction in the biliary tract, which leads to stagnation of bile and the formation of stones with all the ensuing consequences.
The second option is more preferable. But here the form of living these emotions is very important. They must be lived as consciously as possible, without harming other people and yourself. Our emotions are like gasoline in a car. We can start the engine and process this fuel. That is, live them. This means if there is anger, then allow yourself to get angry, if there is fear, then they will be afraid, if there is a lot of pain, then cry, and throw out stormy joy with laughter.
For the disposal of negative emotions in a relationship, a very effective technique. Read about it in the article at the link.
Emotion table
This table contains a list of all possible feelings and emotions.
From myself I will add that, for example, resentment is a combination of repressed anger and pain. Shame is anger at oneself for any manifestation of oneself. Hatred is the unwillingness to see this or that image of the situation - the rejection of the situation.
In this article, I have not disclosed many important aspects of this topic, such as:
- principle here and now
- the logic of the existence of each specific emotion
- stages of development of emotional intelligence
- exchange of states between people
- how an individual and groups of people (family or work collective) live in certain states
- emotional tone scale
- examples from the practice of living / working through various states
- why dreams don't come true
- how love and dream turns into disappointment, regret, then pain, then anger and hatred, and then fear of repetition.
Some of these are covered in other articles on this site. The other part is on my YouTube channel.
I will post the video “Why Dreams Don’t Come True” in this article, as it directly follows from this topic. And he explains how to manage your psyche and life with the help of emotions and images.
And to develop a good skill of transformation and management of emotions, you need at least three months of joint work. To do this, sign up for a consultation and we will draw up a plan of our work.
Sincerely,
psychologist Borisov Dmitry
How to learn to manage your emotions? It often happens that we don’t need the emotions that arise at the moment, or we need completely different ones. We do our best to switch to something else, breathe deeply, analyze our condition. This is correct, but ineffective, especially in emergency situations. Therefore, the management of emotions must be developed in oneself. For this, special exercises have been created that are used in trainings and described in books on psychology.
And the Emotional state is visible to everyone, as it is expressed by the body. When sad, the shoulders are hunched, the head is lowered, and the breathing is slow and heavy. But remember what gestures and facial expressions are when you are happy: the shoulders are straightened, the chin is raised, the chest is forward, the breathing is even, and there is a smile on the face. Repeat these actions, and then your state of mind will change. All processes of the body, physical and mental, are interconnected. Practice at home in front of a mirror and feel this effect.
B It happens that one thought is spinning in my head like a broken record. It interferes with life, spoils the mood and morally corners. It can be someone's harsh words or a fictional conversation with a person with whom you are afraid to speak. In this case, try to make these voices childish and squeaky so that they are not taken so seriously. Parody them in front of a mirror to make you laugh. Another way to get rid of inner voices is to turn on the music, but not in reality, but mentally.
Q See the world through the eyes of a humorist: Describe the situation that threw you off your emotional balance, like some kind of anecdote. Better yet, write it down on paper or tell close person. At first it may seem that this method will not help, but rest assured - you can find a bright side in any situation!
D If you feel that on a psychological level you can’t do something (it seems too boring or difficult), then turn on your imagination. Imagine that this is not a heavy burden, but an exciting activity that will bear fruit. Or assign yourself a reward for doing this work.
All exercises are simple but effective. They are a kind of support for managing emotions, because they have one principle - internal switching from one state to another. Imagine that the brain is like a computer, the processes of which are under your control. Over time, it will be easier to deal with feelings.
Emotion Management Books
- E.P. Ilyin "Emotions and feelings". Before getting acquainted with the management of emotions, first find out what emotions are, what they are, where they come from and how they are expressed at the level of psychology and physiology. This book will tell about it.
- Paul Ekman, The Psychology of Emotions. I know what you feel". The book will teach you to recognize emotions in yourself and other people, evaluate and correct in the early stages of manifestation. Thinking is based on personal experience and author's research.
- Ruslan Zhukovets “How to tame emotions. Self-control techniques professional psychologist". This book is more serious, because it tells what processes occur in the body during the experience of emotions: why and how negative emotions spoil our health. In addition, it will show how to get rid of excessive emotionality.
- Nina Rubshtein "Emotion Management Training". It contains exercises for controlling emotions and many useful information about their occurrence. The book exists only in electronic form.
- Sandra Ingerman "Releasing Unpleasant Thoughts and Emotions". The book has many positive reviews, as it describes specific techniques for controlling emotions. As the author emphasizes, what has been written will be useful to those who are interested in psychology and spiritual development, and who also want to be healthy and happy.
Those who want to be less emotional should turn to printed sources, video resources and presentations. It can be paid trainings, seminars or free videos on YouTube. To improve the effect, it is worth attending such events live, because there is an opportunity to discuss an exciting problem with other participants in the training and ask questions to the facilitator.
How to control emotions when speaking in public: literature, advice, training
It is much easier to manage emotions when everything happens at the everyday level. But when you are training in front of dozens of people, the management of emotions comes to naught. Before the performance, inexperienced speakers develop a fear of failure, which manifests itself unpredictably on stage. Therefore, learn to keep yourself under control and apply the knowledge gained in practice.
Emotion Management Literature:
- Radislav Gandapas "Kama Sutra for the speaker". This is a reference book for those who want to be or are already a professional speaker. It is small in size, but contains a lot of useful information about the process of preparing for a speech and overcoming fear and anxiety. Be sure to read other books by the author and visit or watch online trainings. The choice is large, so they are useful speakers and those who want to be a leader and entrepreneur.
- George Colriser Rescue a Hostage. How to manage emotions, influence people and resolve conflicts. Practical Tips experienced negotiator. This book is for those who don't want to be held hostage to their own thoughts and other people's; who wants to understand personal psychology, as well as learn how to control themselves in the process of negotiations and presentations.
- Dale Carnegie How to Build Self-Confidence and Influence People by Speaking in Public. The classic book on psychology public speaking. She will teach you to be confident on stage, but less emotional. The recommendations from here are used in public speaking training.
1 Don't be afraid to make mistakes. This fear keeps aspiring speakers from taking the stage. Remember that professional trainers have made mistakes, but that hasn't stopped them from succeeding in the least. Answer the question: “What happens if I make a mistake?” Most likely nothing.
2 Don't focus on failure. If you think about the bad development of events, it will happen. Therefore, present the performance only in at its best. After all, if you constantly scroll in your head, how you stutter, and the audience laughs, then your performance will decrease. This means that the preparation process will become a difficult test for you, just like the performance itself.
3 Do not use stimulants. Coffee, alcohol and sedatives will not help to calm down. On the contrary, you will become inhibited. Better sleep before the event.
4 Think about appearance. Be sure to put yourself in order: do your hair, make up appropriately (if you are a girl), wear appropriate clothes for the occasion. Clothing should be fashionable, comfortable and not shocking. Consider the reaction of the general public, because clothes that are “normal” for you may cause bewilderment for others. Girls do not need to sin with jewelry. It is better to choose an accessory that suits the occasion in advance, and not to wear everything in a row. Such simple preparations will add self-confidence.
5 Forget about the past. If you have had a bad performance experience, don't think that every training will be the same. Learn from your mistakes, improve and move on. With experience, these problems will become less .
To be emotional person not bad if you experience positive emotions. But if you feel anger, fear, despondency and cannot get rid of them, change. Negative emotions harm mental and physical health. Try it, because it is easier to do than it seems at first glance. Do the exercises, read useful books, attend trainings, and you will definitely succeed!
Emotion management skills allow us to deal effectively with our emotional reactions. Although we cannot always control our feelings, we can control what we do in response to those feelings. The first step to becoming better in control of your emotions starts with learning to recognize emotions and how they affect your life.
Without the ability to notice the emotional reaction, recognize it and give it its due, we will not perceive ourselves as a source of action in our environment. This can lead to other people influencing your emotions without your consent. Thus, one can become like a person who found himself in a raging ocean with only one oar in his hands, and experience a feeling of powerlessness.
How can we overcome this illogical belief that other people have the power to evoke an emotional response in us? It all starts with learning to manage emotions. Below are excellent methods for managing emotions. These methods have been reviewed by Dr. Marsha Linehan, Director of the Behavior Research and Treatment Clinic, author of Dialectical Behavior Therapy. Starting with the seventh method, all other methods were taken and processed from the Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Manual (McKay, Wood, & Brantley, 2007).
1. Identification and designation of emotional reaction
The first step to managing emotions is learning to recognize and label current emotions. The complexity inherent in emotional processes makes this step deceptively difficult. The process of identifying emotions requires you to be able to notice/observe your reactions as much as it is to be able to describe emotional manifestations.
Try to focus on observation and description:
1) the event that gave rise to the emotion;
2) the meaning attached to this event;
3) sensations from this emotion - bodily sensations, etc.;
4) the behavior expressed in movements that arose due to this emotion;
5) the impact of this emotion on your personal functional status.
2. Identifying barriers to changing emotions
It can be very difficult to change our deep-seated emotional reactions, because over time we have become accustomed to responding to certain events in a certain predictable way. It can be especially difficult to change emotional reactions that do not benefit us, but for which there are always arguments to justify (for example, “I know that I should not take sleeping pills, but when I take them, I feel better”).
Emotions usually have two functions: to alert others and to justify one's own behavior. We often use emotional responses to try (even unconsciously) to influence or control other people's behavior, as well as to explain our perception/interpretation of certain events. To manage emotions, it is extremely important to be able to recognize the function of a particular emotional reaction and understand why you express these emotions in this way.
3. Decreased sensitivity to the level of "emotional intelligence"
If we are under stress from physical activity or stress under the influence of external factors, therefore, on such days we are more vulnerable to emotional reactivity. The key to regulating emotions is maintaining a healthy balance in various areas of daily activities. Thus, we prevent our physical, mental and emotional overstrain.
To reduce emotional sensitivity, you need to develop the habit of eating a balanced diet, getting enough sleep, exercising appropriately for you, abstaining from psychotropic substances unless they have been prescribed for you by a doctor, and increasing the self-confidence that comes in action when you see your performance. and begin to realize your competence.
4. Increasing the number of events that bring positive emotions
Dialectical behavior therapy is based on the assumption that people "feel bad for good reasons." The perception of events that cause strong emotions can be changed, but the emotions still remain. An important way to manage emotions is to exercise control over the events that trigger those emotions.
What can be done right away is to increase the number of positive events in your life. The long term is a fundamental lifestyle change that will increase the frequency of positive events. In this case, it is important to remember that you need to pay attention to the positive events taking place in your life.
5. Increased psychological involvement in currently available emotions
Dr. Linehan (1993) explains that "by showing one's pain and anguish, but not attributing this display to negative emotions, one ceases to induce secondary negative emotions." When we actively reason that this or that emotion is “bad”, as a result we fall into a “bad” emotional state and feel guilt, sadness, sadness, or anger. By adding these harmful feelings to an already negative situation, we only amplify the harm and make and complicate the situation that the negative event caused.
By learning to understand your emotional state (for example, without trying to change or block your emotions), you will be able to transfer stressful situation without adding fuel to the fire (i.e. without increasing the amount of negative emotions). This does not mean that you should not perceive the event as one that hurts and treat it accordingly, it just means that you should remember not to let the emotions you express interfere with your ability to respond to the world around you properly. .
Consider how you can apply these emotion management techniques to your daily life. The process of learning to manage emotions takes practice. This new skill must be recognized, it must be learned to apply and practice all the time. Whenever you encounter a situation that you know will be a source of intense emotion, try to take it as an opportunity to practice these emotion management techniques. Have you noticed that when you pay more attention to your emotions and are aware of them, your feelings change?
6. Using the opposite action
An important method of dialectical behavior therapy for modifying or managing strong emotions is to change the "behavioural-expressive component through actions that are contrary to the emotions" (Linehan, 1993, p. 151). The use of the opposite action does not imply inhibition of the expression of an emotion, but rather simply the expression of another emotion.
An example would be the subjective feeling of being overwhelmed when a person does not want to get up in bed and interact with other people, and the opposing decision to get up and walk around the neighborhood, which does not prohibit the existence of the first feeling, but is opposed to it. Most likely, it is impossible to immediately get rid of the state of depression, but this state can be countered by positive changes in your feelings.
7. Applying Suffering Techniques
When you feel anger, sadness, or anxiety, you feel like you need to do something urgently to stop or dull those unbearable negative emotions. In fact, states with strong negative emotions can be tolerated. Taking impulsive actions, from overwhelming negative emotions, you only worsen the situation.
8. Decreasing physical sensitivity as a way to deal with emotions
This method is similar to the method of desensitization to the level of "emotional intelligence". In order to deal with unwanted emotions, as well as identifying and understanding how thoughts and behaviors affect your emotions, it is important to recognize the physical condition that makes you more or less susceptible to these emotions.
You can determine the extent to which your physical condition affects your emotions by asking yourself the following questions:
- How does my diet affect my well-being?
- How does overeating or undereating immediately affect me, and what are the long-term consequences of these actions?
- How does alcohol and pills affect me immediately, and what are the long-term consequences of taking them?
- How does my sleep (or lack thereof) affect my well-being?
9. Revealing emotions
The main goal of dialectical behavior therapy is to learn to see your emotions, not avoid them. When we are aware of our emotional state, we have a choice of how we react to the situation and how we will feel. Emotion detection begins with keeping a record of the events that affected your emotions and extracting specific emotions for later management or elimination of those emotions. By writing down the events that influenced your emotional state, you will learn to identify your typical reaction to certain emotions.
If you know that, for example, you need to make a great effort to extinguish a fit of anger, you must learn (slowly at first) to observe this negative emotion, how the body reacts to it and the impulses that arise, and try to avoid judgment, that may arise in connection with this emotion. This process of gradually revealing emotions must be accompanied by an attentive attitude to everything that you experience.
10. Mindfulness of your emotions without making judgments
If you are attentive to your emotions, but do not judge them, then you reduce the likelihood of their increase in intensity. This mindful recognition especially helps you deal with unwanted emotions. Concentrate on your breathing, observe the emotions that you are experiencing at the moment.
Try to look at your emotional state through the eyes of an outside observer. Just notice everything that happens - do not divide what is happening into “bad” or “good”. Getting your emotions under control can be very difficult. Pay attention to all your thoughts and judgments about the emotions you are experiencing (or even your intentions stemming from the emotions) and let them run their course. What will you get in the end if you do all this?
Try to find ways to apply these emotion management techniques in your daily life. How you work to become more aware of your ability to consciously observe your emotions and how you express those emotions.
- Psychology: personality and business