Five Simple Tools That Can Help Regulate Your Emotions

If there’s anything that might qualify as the secret formula for life success, it might be healthy emotional regulation. Anyone who can experience all their emotions without being governed by them has found a shortcut to a happier life. Far too often, we react without self-control and end up wishing we had created a little more space between what we felt and what we did about it.

Generally speaking, we have three broad options each time emotions begin to emerge. We can shove down those feelings or allow them to make us behave impulsively. The third option is the goal. That involves developing emotional regulation and using our feelings to guide us to wise decisions. But how can we make this our default setting?

A Little More about Emotional Regulation

Life has always been a convergence of experiences, thoughts, and potential triggers. In the digital age, everything happens at warp speed. Whatever trouble we had with regulating emotions in the past is now even more challenging. Second by second, we’re confronted with stimuli pushing us to react or suppress. There appears to be very little reward for modulating our responses. That’s not what gets clicks, likes, and shares.

However, a lack of emotional regulation is a recipe for trouble. Our relationships, jobs, and general well-being can be negatively impacted unless we take active steps to live our lives in a more grounded way.

Five Simple Tools that Can Help Regulate Your Emotions

1. Assess Your Triggers and Responses

When you know what triggers you and what that means to you, you’re halfway toward healthy regulation. For many of us, emotional eruptions seem to come out of nowhere. Cause and effect are real and are the key to identifying counterproductive patterns. Journaling is an ideal choice to help discover these patterns, and that journal will be helpful in your therapy sessions.

2. Assess Your Level of Control

We may fantasize that we can control our surroundings, but this is far from the truth. When you opt to recognize what is and isn’t under your control, you grant yourself the power to focus on what you can change. Everything else is what you must learn to tolerate. Knowing the difference between the two is, in itself, a form of emotional regulation.

3. Be Open to Change

Quite often, the comfort zones we’ve settled into play a big role in keeping our emotions so volatile. This can help you in two ways. In the short term, when you feel triggered, you have the option to detach and relocate. Release the prideful desire to “win” and recognize that the real victory lies in finding your peace. On a larger scale, you may be caught up in relationships, a job, friendships, and more that are not conducive to calm assessment. Carefully evaluate what might need to change.

4. Discover Healthy New Forms of Expression

As touched on above, you don’t have to explode or suppress. You can instead learn new skills that empower you to productively express your feelings.

5. Choose Mindfulness

When you situate yourself in the present moment, it’s far less probable that you’ll lose control. In the present, you can see more clearly the factors at play. This skill can be developed through practices like meditation.

Therapy Can Be Where the Big Changes Begin

The reality behind emotional regulation is that you might need a professional guide. Self-help is awesome, but what happens when a long-standing button is pushed? When you work with a counselor who can guide you through anxiety therapy, the playing field shifts. Let’s make time soon to talk more about the possibilities.