The Best Technique To Manage Your Emotions in 5 Minutes
Ready to start laughing about how easy it is to manage your emotions in a few minutes?
Then you’re going to love one of my favorite techniques.
The trick is to observe and be curious and I learned it from Russ Harris.
I read his book “The Happiness Trap”, over one million copies sold, in 2013 during my midlife crisis. He writes about the Acceptance and Commitment Therapy ACT.
I used all his methods back then to get through my burnout and midlife crisis by strictly following his methods; without any Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitor, SSRI’s.
This year I bought the new and improved edition and found the, by far, easiest way to manage my emotions and it made me burst into laughter once I nailed it.
Acknowledge
“Acknowledge” is a winning strategy where you capture the emotion you are having by making yourself curious. You make yourself so curious that you’re compelled to learn more.
Acknowledging that you have an emotion and identifying which emotion you’re having will capture your attention despite being under the influence of the emotion.
Acknowledging is also another way to be accountable which is a virtue.
Acknowledging the emotion you’re having and observing it will fascinate you as to why the emotion is there in the first place. It is meant to make you lean into the journey of “why” the emotion is taking hold of you.
So today I’m passing along this useful technique of managing your emotions in just 5 minutes (minus reading all 363 pages), so you can use acknowledgment in your life to maximize your mental health and relationships.
Let’s dive in.
The Problem with Controlling
99% of people fail to manage their emotions.
I have:
1. talked to thousands of people,
2. read almost a hundred scientific papers on personality psychology,
3. taken a course in personality psychology,
4. read about neuropsychology and the brain hemispheres
and now I can see why.
The average person does not know having a negative emotion will automatically instill cognitive friction. Their immediate response is to force all others into their worldview or as I call it, the mental model of their particular world.
So what are the usual responses?
You made me feel bad!
Why aren't you doing as I want you to?
Why are you forcing your facts onto my worldview or mental model?
I am right and you’re wrong!
Yawn
This way of thinking is reptilian and is the easiest way to dig a hole for yourself. And the worst part? You might be a great person.
But no one cares if you can not manage your emotions.
Acknowledging Is the Opposite of Controlling
Here are some simple exercises you can use to introduce acknowledging your emotions into your life right now:
Exercise 1: Identify what emotion you’re having in the next hour.
What is the exact emotion you are having?
Examples: Are you:
- Sad
- Angry
- Stressed
- Happy
- Irritated
- Spiteful
- Depressed
- Afraid
- Surprised
- Revengeful
- Contentious
Exercise 2: Is it a person that made you feel this way? Or is it a physical thing that made you feel this way? Or is it something totally out of your control that made you feel this way?
Example: My lover made me angry! My iPhone is not doing what I want and need it to do! The government is taxing me more than I can afford!
Exercise 3: Identify why that made you feel this way.
Example: My lover did not speak to me in the tone of voice I needed to feel a specific way. My iPhone shuts down when I need to use it. The government takes too much money from me so I can’t pay for that vacation.
See how easy it is to identify why you’re having a particular emotion.
Transitioning from Controlling to Acknowledging
I love to acknowledge my emotions because it makes me accountable. And I lose the need for control. It is exciting to always find yourself on an exploration to find out what is going on.
Check out these examples of moving from controlling to acknowledging.
Controlling: “You have to say you’re sorry and that I am right!”
Acknowledging: “Feel angry. This person does not agree with me. Why does this person need to agree with me?”
Controlling: “I hate my iPhone because it never works when I need it to!”
Acknowledging: “I am upset with my iPhone. It does not do what I need it to. Why does it not do exactly what I need it to do?”
Controlling: “I hate the government for taking all my money away!”
Acknowledging: "I am angry with the government. It does not leave my money alone. Why does the government take money from me?”
See how you can turn your emotions into fascinating questions making you curious about learning more.
That’s the power of acknowledging.
Now, you just need to deliver.
Putting Acknowledging Into Practice
Here’s your action step for today:
Acknowledge one emotion today.
Identify if a person or thing triggered that emotion.
Ask yourself why that emotion got triggered.
Once you identify your first emotion and start observing it as a bystander you will most likely laugh about how easy it is to acknowledge and observe it as a bystander or a spectator in the audience of a concert.
Your relationships will love you for it, you will feel more in control, you will be perceived as more professional by others, and people will trust you more. Even your iPhone
If you like psychological tips like this and want to manage your emotions and more, subscribe to my newsletter, or watch for my coming courses.
I hope you enjoyed today’s lesson.
And now it’s time to get out there and acknowledge your emotions.
Good luck, and see you next week.