Choosing your own life!

Emotions are what shape us into what we are today, and obviously, it is important. You might be having a good laugh at a text message or feeling frustrated when the day doesn’t go as planned, and in the end you will know that highs and lows you experience can significantly affect your well-being. Tony Robbins, the famous entrepreneur and best-selling author once said that our feelings do not arise from the facts but it actually come from the meaning that we interpret from the facts (Anthony Robbins, 2007).

There are studies pointed out that people fail to manipulate their self-control especially when they are in negative emotions such as anger, anxiety, fear and sadness (Chester et al., 2016). But the questions is, are you going to let it knock you down or are you going to master it to empower and enlighten the path that you are enduring in life? There are 3 simple tips given by Anthony Robbins to help us to overcome negative emotions and improve the situation (Anthony Robbins, 2007).

The Story We Tell Ourselves

We constantly decide what the events and experiences in our life mean, unconsciously. The same story given to a person, with a different perspective, the outcome could be completely different. Let’s take an example of a disabled child. He can be a person who devalues himself all the time, and thinks that he doesn’t deserve to be loved due to his natural capabilities. BUT he can also take the opposite approach where he considers the fact that his parents still shower him with endless patience and love. The former story creates a sense of loss and the latter celebrates his life and his worth. The story that he is going to choose is definitely going to affect his whole life.

Trade Your Expectations to Appreciation

We are wired in the way that we will tell ourselves stories that make us discouraged when we could be feeling joy because we always want to prepare ourselves for the worst situation. Yet, we can change this by trading our expectations to appreciations. The disabled child will have expected that he should be born as a normal child, and this could ruin his whole life. BUT he has a choice to appreciate that his parents still treat him like a normal person by not judging and abandon him in children’s home. And this is the power of changing his expectations to appreciations.

Taking Back Control

The only thing that keeping you from what you want is always yourself. It is totally up to you to decide whether to offer yourself a new core of belief or to put yourself into the most painful and traumatic events. Bear in mind that although we cannot control the events that happen in our lives, we can still master how we experience these events.

Experience often shapes ability. It’s time to be the boss to your feelings rather than being control and act like a slave. This direction that the emotions are leading you to is determined by how you think and how you manipulate. When you come up with a meaning, you can then get a new perspective, and lead to a new life. Smile and let it go!

References

Anthony Robbins (2007) Awaken the Giant Within: How to Take Immediate Control of Your Mental, Emotional, Physical and Financial Destiny! New York: Free Press. 
Chester, D.S., Lynam, D.R., Milich, R., Powell, D.K., Anderson, A.H. and DeWall, C.N. (2016) How do negative emotions impair self-control? A neutral model of negative urgency. Neurolmage [online], V.132, pp. 43-50.

Available through ScienceDirect.

[Accessed: 29^th July 2017]

By: Yau Che Yan, BAF1541