It is an exercise that we must do, at least once in our lives, to understand ourselves better. Even to be able to have a better relationship with others and with ourselves. Read carefully and put it into practice.
To begin, you must know how to name them with the wheel of emotions:
Remember that emotions cannot be controlled, you learn from them to be able to manage them. For that we have to identify what we feel and when we feel it.
In this first exercise you must identify what the primary emotion you are experiencing is and advance to the second and third wheels.
For example: Primary emotion: fear. Within the six options in the second round, I identify that I feel scared and I realize that I may be scared or frightened.
Understand them to be able to manage them
You must also understand them, you can do it with this exercise:
- Name the emotion (lean on the wheel of emotions): “I am feeling __________” (Basic emotions such as: fear, joy, anger, sadness, surprise, disgust).
- Identify what caused it: “When the emotion arose, I was (place) _______, with (people) ___________ and my thoughts were ___________.”
- Identify the behavior that the emotion led you to: “When I feel _________ I do (behavior) _____________.”
- Question the emotion: Did the emotion lead me to dysfunctional behaviors? What can I do for myself when I feel like this? Is the emotion reasonable for the situation? Is the situation under my control? What I can do?
- Also ask yourself: How do I usually deal with emotion? (When I’m sad I go for a run, call a friend or watch a movie, etc.) ________________. At this point it is important that you identify and build your tool kit for these moments.
How would you like to respond when you feel rage, anger, sadness, disgust? You can plan what to do when it happens. It has been shown that those who have a greater vocabulary of emotions tend to have better emotional management. Add words and give them a feeling.
Drawing exercise for a moment of emotional emergency
Focus your emotion on another task to reduce the intensity of what you feel:
If you feel that the emotion is too strong and is taking you out of control, what you can do is try to start a very simple and automatic task like drawing.
Sit down, draw lines on a piece of paper, and focus your attention on the lines. You will see that as you fill out the sheet, the emotion begins to decrease.
Why does this happen?
Because you are diverting attention from the situation that caused you discomfort to a new neutral situation such as drawing lines.
The important thing is that while you do the exercise you focus on the action of drawing, making sure they are straight and seeing how it looks colorful, in case you use different colors. Do not draw the lines thinking about what caused your discomfort because you will not move forward and the emotion will continue to accompany you.