Check Out 1 Thing You Can Control
One Thing You CAN Control:
Are you feeling out of control these days? You’re not alone. There is one thing you can control: yourself. You are the one thing that you can control.
You have free will and you are driving the bus of your reactions to people, events and circumstances around you. How you choose to respond to exterior events around you will determine how successfully you move through life. The choice IS yours and will make all the difference in the outcomes you experience.
A helpful place to start regaining control is to become aware of your judgments, towards yourself and others. Let’s take a closer look.
On a scale from 0-100%, what percentage of your thoughts during the day flow from a judgment. For example, when something does not work out the way you want it to, where does your mind go? What specific thoughts pop up in your mind about the undesirable event or situation? What judgment do you make, towards yourself or others?
As Jesus said, if you want to see clearly, take the beam out of your own eye. What makes up your plank? (Matthew 7:5). Clarity of focus leads to accuracy of response.
Metacognition is the awareness and understanding of your thought processes. Simply put, it’s thinking about what you are thinking about.
Once you have identified the thought that led to a negative emotion (remember, an emotion is your body’s response to your thought life), you can then choose to change the channel of your focus: from the perceived problem or undesirable outcome to a thought that promotes innovation for solution and positive connection with yourself and people around you.
Emotional Intelligence (EQ) is the capacity, skill or ability to identify, assess and manage the emotions of one’s self or others and of groups (Source: Wolfram Alpha).
EQ includes 4 phases posed as questions worth your reflection:
- How aware am I of my own emotions? Perceptions, beliefs, assumptions that trigger my emotions? Judgments?
- How capable am I at managing my own emotions?
- How aware am I of the emotions of other people?
- How capable am I at managing the emotions of other people?
Studies have continued to point to one BIG FAT behavior that is directly linked to positive leadership and impact on business and relationships: IMPULSE CONTROL. Your ability to effectively lead and connect with others is in direct correlation to your ability to practice the behavior of impulse control: the ability to control your desire for immediate satisfaction will directly influence success in relationships, school and career.
What does that look like? It is the ability to pause before responding and intentionally choose words and behaviors that align with the highest version of who you are committed to being.
Imagine a stage and on the stage is your “drama”. You are the producer of this drama. You can cast yourself as the main character or not.
When you choose to get off the stage, you disassociate yourself from the chaos associated with the drama around you. You become the observer of the drama vs. the main character. From this place of observation you can then consciously choose how you want to respond rather than reacting to the judgments and criticisms around you. Judgments and criticisms always walk hand in hand with drama. Impulse control or as Paul says in 2 Timothy 1:7: For God did not give us a spirit of timidity but of power, LOVE and self-control…the ability to control your impulse to jump smack in the middle of the drama.
Anger is one of the quickest emotions to sift through your body. It’s most commonly fueled by fear: fear of not being right, liked or understood. Anger also releasing a chemical in the brain that is addictive. The more anger you give to the center stage of your thoughts the madder you will become. Starve it of your attention and you will become a free man or woman.
Impulse control involves you the ability to override your innate desire for immediate gratification. Negative behaviors often associated with lack of impulse control include: bullying; micro-managing people; ugly talk; defensive behavior and stone walling. In neuroscience, this type of behavior is fueled by “BOTTOM UP” thinking (fight/flight/freeze: primal brain).
Positive behaviors linked to the art of impulse control include: appreciative inquiry; effective questioning; empathetic responses; reflection; intentional responses fueled by a desire to understand another’s point of view. In neuroscience this type of behavior is fueled by “TOP DOWN” thinking (frontal cortex, executive thinking part of the brain that is solution oriented and fueled by the fruit of the Spirit: Self-control).
Practice: The more you practice delaying gratification of your strong impulsive and reactive behavior the easier it will get. Your brain will actually retrain itself in the direction of impulse control which will lead to the all powerful PAUSE and give you the space to up your EQ game in life along with your IMPACT in BUSINESS and personal life.
Take Action:
Delay gratification of strong negative emotions that lead to destructive behaviors. Reflect on how you controlled your involvement with the drama at the end of each day this week. Ask yourself:
- How quickly did I control my choice to jump on the stage today?
- What thought change did I consciously focus on that expanded my ability to tune into healthy options of response to situations?
- How specifically can I do more of that tomorrow than I did today?
Faith Based Coaching: New Edge God In Podcast: Listen In:
How to Choose Love Over Judgment,co-host Judy Kinnebrew.
