It’s easier to manage stress effectively when we are emotionally strong. It’s a life skill that makes life easier.
Becoming mentally strong isn’t about turning bulletproof to emotions. It means experiencing emotions but also having the skill to recover & grow from it.
So let’s get straight to the habits that help us develop this life skill and make it a part of our daily approach to life.
1. Habit of identifying emotions
A good starting point is to check whether we are mad, sad, glad, afraid instead of just feeling upset or feeling off.
Emotions are important for our survival, just like physical pain because they have a special purpose in our life. Physical pain tells us which part of our body has something wrong going on with it. And so we focus our attention on that part and do what needs to be done to get it back to normal.
And broadly speaking, emotions too serve a similar purpose. They are there to tell us the need for a certain action. Like, getting jealous could mean there’s something we would like to have in our life and it would be a good idea to keep working towards that, or feeling joyful would mean doing more of that thing.
According to psychotherapist and international speaker Sheri Van Dijk, emotions are really helpful to analyze and handle situations effectively. But they start hurting the quality of our life when they stay on after delivering the message because they clutter up our life.
So when we get into the habit of identifying our emotions, it becomes easier to find out what message for action they carry, to take that action, and move on with life.
2. Habit of taking a pause
Now, there are some knee-jerk reactions that are subconscious, and so not really in our control like feeling anger flare-up at an unjust accusation or feeling hurt at a thoughtless remark.
But that’s normal, that’s just human. And what helps handle these situations effectively, come out of the experience emotionally strong is the habit of taking a pause. Taking a pause before acting on our first instinct. Holding the response or reaction to analyze what’s really happening first.
The key is to get comfortable with our unique blend of qualities so that we have a healthy value of self-worth. This helps see more quickly when something is way off the truth and so doesn’t deserve spending our emotional energy on.
Remember that people’s opinions are just that – their way of looking at things through their own issues and biases. And so if a feedback isn’t constructive, it’s in no way more valid than what we know or think.
3. Taking action makes us emotionally strong
Now it’s one thing to worry about something and come up with a tentative action plan because that’s productive, that takes our life forward.
But worrying about things out of our control or ruminating about the past only intensifies the emotions attached to those.
Obsessing over the past or worrying our head off over what might happen in the future, worrying without any goal or action plan only hurts our present.
We know now that emotions are there to trigger some kind of action. And so to manage emotions better, to become emotionally strong, we need to get into the habit of taking action.
There will always be things out of our control but also those that we can do something about. And the key is to focus on those, plan what can be done right now about the things within our control.
But when our mind is chock full of thoughts about things that need to be done, ideas, hurts, worries, it becomes difficult to handle emotions better, be able to see things clearly & know the right approach to choose.
All the clutter makes it difficult to focus effectively. And so it’s important to keep our mental space organized, do those little things that declutter our mind.
Head over here to know which habits help declutter your mind effectively.
