How can you and I better manage our emotions so we are consistently living in a space open to what’s possible for us? I will give you a clue, it doesn’t start from the external place, those things around us, but it begins at the internal place of our beliefs.
Are you living in beliefs, feelings, and moods that constrain, constrict, and limit what is possible?
Whether we are talking about relationships, careers, finances, health, or new learning of any kind, we are fundamentally walking, breathing, and living in what we believe is possible.
So how can we see what is truly possible?
Emotions play a big role in the possibilities I can see. The duration of an emotion has an even greater impact because it lays down a foundation for the creation of a mood, and moods are what you and I live in. They can last days, weeks, months, even a life time. They can be present for so long, one doesn’t even consciously see them anymore.
There are of course positive moods and negative moods.
If my base mood is one of joy, peace, love, happiness, satisfaction, contentment (choose any positive, upbeat descriptor of a mood that resonates with you), then the possibilities that I can see for my situation, my circumstances, my life are many. My world grows.
If I take another set of moods like anger, fear, anxiousness, shame, bitterness (again pick any negative mood descriptor that works for you), then the possibilities I can see are few. My world is made small and I become limited in my ability to see all that is possible for me.
Without possibilities, I have fewer options. Without options, I become stuck, stagnant, and/or frozen.
So how can I shift myself out of a shitty, anxious, fearful, depressed mood that limits the possibilities I can see? I ask myself some questions in three areas:
1. Facts
Facts are the things “that cannot change”. They are the past, and those things that cannot change in my present and immediate future. They are the landscape of “what is” that I do not control.
2. Possibilities
Possibilities are what create the mental and emotional landscape of wide open spaces from which to live. They are the things of “what is open to change”. And from there, what actions are then possible; what choices are then available.
3. Uncertainty
The world is an uncertain place. Do you accept that? When I accept uncertainty as part of my life’s landscape, I believe I can be much more effective at actually managing my life.
In the next post, I will will show you how I use Facts, Possibilities, and Uncertainty in my life to manage my emotions and expand my possibilities.
You may also like to read, “Changing Moods and Emotions, Part 2”
Image Credit: https://pixabay.com/photos/happiness-joy-pure-air-freedom-1866081
