Taking Responsibility for Your Emotions

“This makes me so angry!”

How many times have you heard someone say this? Have you said it yourself?

It’s a pretty typical way to phrase such a statement and its unconscious implications are quite significant.

How so?

You see, this phrasing implies that something outside of yourself controls your inner state of being. It’s saying that your emotions are dominated by what’s happening outside of you and that instead of proactively choosing a response to the event, you’re automatically and robotically reacting to a external stimuli.

The truth is that nothing outside of you can control your inner state of Well-Being. In fact, nothing truly causes anything. Events and circumstances may certainly influence you to select one state over another, but they do not have the ability to literally “make you angry” or “make you happy.”

Recognizing this, let’s make a shift in the way we phrase the statement, “This makes me so angry!”

Let’s remind ourselves of the underlying reality by changing the statement to read,“This event creates the context in which I choose to feel anger.”

It may sound like an issue of semantics at first, but it’s really deeper than this. By shifting the way you phrase this statement, you’ll continuously come to realize that your emotions are in fact your choice, that you can take responsibility for deciding whether you choose to feel good or not.

“This event creates the context in which I choose to feel happy.”

How do you think this impacts any addictions or habits that you may have picked up in order to feel good?

This change in phrasing can bring you a tremendous sense in freedom. It can help remove the barriers you’ve set up to resisting your own sense of joy and wonder. Happiness can be a continuously experienced state. Make this simple change in your wording and you’ll bring yourself a step closer to this place of continuous Well-Being.

“ABC creates the context in which I choose to feel XYZ.”