Be In Control Of Your Emotions
May 7, 2020
All of us have different shades to our personalities. I have mine too.
Everyone in my family, friends circle, work colleagues, know me, and see me as a calm, composed individual who is always in control of his emotions and never loses his calm. After all, I am passionate about helping others in their self-improvement journeys.
The reality is that I am not perfect, and there have been a couple of instances where an “ugly” part of my surfaced when I was not in control of my emotions.
I remember an episode involving my teenaged son, where he came asking me to help him with some academic work. When I tried explaining a concept to him, he did not like it and said something that my mind perceived as rude and disrespectful. I could see myself losing control of my emotions and my senses. I hit back aggressively. The worst part was that I started getting abusive. I became a poet of abuse, in full flow. “what the *@#$ are you saying. I did not come to you for help. You came to me. If you can’t *@#$#$% deal with what I am explaining, stop wasting my time.”
My son had the presence of mind to understand that I had lost it. He let me blow my steam off and then said: ” you could have made your point without getting all emotional and abusive.”
When I am in control of my emotional state, I reveal a beautiful me to the world. When I am not in control of my emotions, an ugly, disgusting me shows up.
I know that I have improved in managing my emotional state because such episodes have become rare. But, I have to remind myself always that there is a part of me that is dark and can still come out in certain situations. My wisdom is in recognizing this fact and ensuring that I keep myself protected from getting to that point.
Our mind is like a garden that needs to be mindfully tended to; if not, weeds of our ego can grow wild to derail our emotional state. It takes very little for a beautiful garden to get transformed into an ugly weed-infested backyard.
Managing mindset is, therefore, a continuous process. The example I give here is about anger, but it could be any other negative emotion- Jealousy, Fear, insecurity, contempt, etc. Be a mindful gardener- cultivate your mind regularly to keep away the weeds of negative emotions and focus on a positive mindset that blooms thoughts that are like flowers and fruits.
