The Blue Heart - Discovering Emotional Control

almost 3 years ago (Edited)

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“It is important not to suppress your feelings altogether when you are depressed. It is equally important to avoid terrible arguments or expressions of outrage. You should steer clear of emotionally damaging behavior. People forgive, but it is best not to stir things up to the point at which forgiveness is required. When you are depressed, you need the love of other people, and yet depression fosters actions that destroy that love. Depressed people often stick pins into their own life rafts. The conscious mind can intervene. One is not helpless.”
― Andrew Solomon

I lost count a long time ago of all instances in which I have been unable to control my emotions… most times it ended badly and once the heightened extreme passes more often than not there is a lot of regret for things said, done or even thought. I will say however, that through these experiences – being the one experiencing the emotion as well as being on the receiving end of someone else’s, I have learnt well the importance of not being controlled by my emotions – forcing a state of release and finding a way through the chaos without causing mass destruction along the way. This can be such an incredibly hard thing to achieve because emotion can literally become suffocating and physically debilitating, but it is well worth the effort for the preservation of the many that often get hurt along the way – including ourselves.

Getting swept away by our emotions, either positively or negatively is something we have all experienced many times in our lives – sometimes more severely than others and each experience and occasion completely unique, but every time, high or low there is a lack of control. Emotions are powerful and when it comes to the ones which take us on a down swing, equally dangerous if not controlled or at the very least managed - and managing your emotions is not the same as suppressing them.

“It is not necessary to react to everything you notice.”

Each emotion we experience determines how we perceive situations and events. The same thing can happen to you in two different states of mind and you will have completely opposite outcomes and reactions because of the way you were feeling at the time. Sometimes, the best way to try and reach an objective perspective is to step away from the situation, or to imagine it happening to someone else and not yourself. This puts you back into a position of control, because emotions are not conscious decisions, hence they can become a bit like a wild fire. Many emotional responses are strongly connected to memories and those memories can act as triggers.

When it comes to my own life – more now, than ever before, I do my best to “keep myself in check” in emotionally charged situations, for the simple reason that I have been through a TRUCK LOAD of shit along the way. Lost control, found control… fallen down, gotten back up – not recognised who I was… made a way forward… dropped the ball, lost control again – knocked the fucking dirt off my knees and then ultimately made the decision that I do actually have the ability to steer my own ship, make more sensible decisions and take ownership of my emotional states.

“You got to train your mind to be stronger than your emotions or else you’ll lose yourself every time.”

Passion as an example is an intricate emotion. Deliciously laced, rippled with raw, unfiltered expression and simultaneously drowning in precisely the same. It is something which has led my entire life. It is the reason I am who I am. But – I lost it once, twice and thrice – along with that, I waved goodbye to the ownership of my individuality. I became “whatever that emotion dictated”. I never want to visit that place again. It robbed me – of ME! I have always been a person of light - but I lost that – drowned in darkness – emptiness. I hated it – but lived it for many years, because I lacked the confidence and inner strength to see myself through a repeated practice which would ultimately lead me to better places. Sure, it took a while – but I got there. I found my inner strength and finally realised that “I can” tends to have far healthier results. I suppose you could say my standpoint on the matter is partially driven by fear of losing control again… but also by insistence and protectiveness for what I once lost but managed to find again. I have since learnt that -

Sometimes, we “think” we are in a state of passion, but we are actually in a place of desperation. Sometimes we think we are in a state of passion, but we are actually in a state of depression. Sometimes we think we are in a state of passion, but we are in a state of anxiety. YES – passion plays a part in all of these, but the ratios don’t normally lean in the direction of passion and for it to ACTUALLY be a state of passion the percentages should be reversed. Passion by definition is an uncontrollable emotion, yes – but it’s majority swings toward the positive. What so many of us experience and confuse in the negative form of that – the anger, the jealousy, the hurt, the rage – is not passion itself… it is generally the outcome from lack of acknowledgement or recognition of the passion itself and yet we lump it in the same basket. We shouldn’t, because they are not one and the same. Emotions are so incredibly intricate and multi-faceted, but you cannot simply throw it all under one umbrella.

“Emotion can be the enemy, if you give into your emotion, you lose yourself. You must be at one with your emotions, because the body always follows the mind.” ― Bruce Lee

Take a relationship between two people for instance. Perhaps one or both people are insecure or even jealous. When either one of those individuals loses control of themselves in such a state, they become destructive and ugly towards the other, when in reality all they actually want or need is reassurance, and once received, that uncontrollable bush fire can be extinguished – the problem in most cases though, is actually “reaching out” for that reassurance when in the height and heat of that emotional state. So instead of being short, blunt, dismissive or even ugly to the other person, there needs to be another way of communicating that SOS before things get out of control and one ends up unnecessarily hurting the other. This level of openness requires a level of bravery as well as trust where two people can have some kind of “key” which let’s the other know what is “actually” going on.

In many ways, having something like this in place can play a huge role in developing the habit of control, but when it is just you, on your own… the challenge can feel far more overwhelming but the necessity for achieving it, far greater. If your emotions are constantly in control of you instead of the other way around, your entire life is going to be an endless rollercoaster ride – and not the fun kind either. There needs to be some level of level stability and this is achieved through the learning of control.