One of the most basic emotions of man is fear, and every unknown triggers our fear and anxiety. “What happens if I can’t find a job?”, “What happens if I get fired?” In addition to the fears caused by negative situations such as, not being able to take steps when he gets a new job offer, while being happy during the promotion process, on the other hand, “Can I overcome it?” That’s why we think. Hence we inform employees and job seekers about emotion management and advises on the management of negative emotions.
So what do you need to do?
The formula valid in every area of the development process is the “Event X Response: Result” equation. If we want to change the result, what we are going to change is obvious. One of the mistakes we make in today’s world is to focus on changing the results. However, what we need to do to change the result and ensure permanent development is to change our responses. The real question we have to ask ourselves is, “Why do I react like this? What is the underlying reason for this reaction? ” It is the question.
“What makes me overwhelmed, fearful or anxious in the face of the same event and situation does not cause the same effect in another?” or “How can he be so comfortable while I’m doing so much stress?” you might ask. We do not discover the reasons that cause us to react differently, the emotions that cause these reasons, the thoughts and / or fears under those emotions, and if we do not try to understand, we have no choice but to continue to act the same and get the same results. As Einstein said, “It’s crazy to try to achieve different results by doing the same things all the time.”
So let’s start awareness from our feelings. Emotion awareness “What am I feeling right now?” to answer the question clearly and accurately. It is also very easy to answer this question while expressing those emotions while being happy and cheerful. In the opposite case, that is, when it comes to negative emotions and their management, it is a process that compels us, we try to control or avoid. Here are three emotions that need to be addressed first. These;
Anger: Anger that is one of the negative emotions is one of the burning emotions. The main point to be known in the process of dealing with this feeling is that there is an idea of helplessness under every feeling of anger. For example, while the reason for the desperation that underlies the anger we feel when we are trying to catch up with an important meeting is that we do not have anything at the moment, the precaution we will take to prevent this situation can change many things.
Our acceptance that we are not helpless when we have such options is our first step in the process of dealing with this feeling. Although it sounds like a cliché, the sentence “You are not desperate, you are the remedy” is a very correct sentence with this perspective. Then perhaps all you have to do is answer two questions clearly: What is the thing that pisses you the most? What kind of helplessness do you feel then?
Anger: The human ego doesn’t want two things; stumble and defeat. The overlap of this situation causes anger inside, hence despair and inadequacy to accumulate and inevitably burst of anger, while the person harms not only himself but also others. As our ancestors said, among the things we have to do in order not to fall into the situation of “shield with anger sits with harm”, we can list the following:
Not to accumulate negative emotions in us,
Finding our own methods (walking, doing sports, touching the soil, etc.) in order to remove negative energy from us,
To talk to those who negatively affect us with their words, behaviors or styles, clearly, in time, without delay, and / or prevent them from feeding on us.
Fear: One of the most basic emotions of man is fear and man is afraid that he does not know. Every uncertainty that affects the phenomenon of competence in our self-confidence and every “wonder” question that it raises triggers our fear and anxiety. “What happens if I can’t find a job?”, “What happens if the process gets longer?”, “What happens if I get fired?” Not being able to take steps when he gets new job offers such as fears caused by negative situations such as “I wonder if I can get over it?” This is why they are worried. The key to facing our fears, overcoming them, or taking steps in the process is self-confidence and belief in what one can do. Therefore, taking action to discover and develop our strengths and development aspects, avoiding fear, people, situations and behaviors,
What happens when negative emotions are not managed?
It would not be wrong to say that we will gradually start to lose control when we cannot manage anger, anger and fear, which are negative emotions in both our business and social life. When this situation is experienced for a long time, it will bring discomfort with it. These feelings lie in the psychological roots of panic attacks, vertigo, stomach and intestinal diseases that many people feel today. Since the sensation of one or more of these diseases will trigger the phenomenon of “inadequacy” in the person (I cannot overcome, cannot prevent, etc.), our body’s reaction will be to avoid facing this situation, and depression and fatigue will appear. (The person’s soul does not want anything, to constantly sleep, etc.)
Researches reveal that instead of focusing on self-confidence, self-esteem, self-value development, people prefer to control, avoid, and compare in order to manage negative emotions and not to experience them. Whereas;
Sense of control
Man does not have enough time and performance capacity to control everything. So, as people who know this, “Why are we trying to control everything?” When I ask, your answer may be, “I am a perfectionist, I want to see the problems at the beginning and take precautions”. However, the text under this answer can also be interpreted as “I do not want to encounter any problems, feel comfortable or fail”. If you are a person with a high control dimension, I would suggest asking yourself two questions again: “Why am I so controlling?”, “And what effect does my situation have on other people?”
Reprieve
Avoiding, postponing or ignoring it causes problems to grow and turn to us. Avoiding pain is one of them. “Is he angry with me now, is he offended, or is he broken?” Attitudes and behaviors that we could not display because we thought we could not cope with the words or the consequences that we could not say, cause bigger problems in the future. A candidate who was looking for a new job had good conversations one after another and got a job offer from one of them. However, he demanded a week later than what was said as the start date, as his mind remained with the other company. “Why don’t you call the other company and convey the situation and ask for positive negative feedback?” “Don’t they get it wrong? “Even if he replies, the real reason, as he later said,
Continuous comparison
Benchmarking causes the person to feel unwell temporarily in certain situations, but will cause a continuous comparison, making him unhappy in the long run. Putting ourselves into sacrificial psychology or fainting by focusing on what we cannot be instead of what we have is also among the behaviors and attitudes that affect us negatively.
What can be done to manage negative emotions?
Based on all these points;
Our thoughts become our behavior. Therefore, thinking positively affects our well-being and constructive behavior. There is a difference between starting the day by saying “I am fine, I am pleasant and enjoyable” and starting with whining.
It is important to discover our fears, to replace them with positive thoughts, to feel good and to manage our negative emotions. The difference between a candidate who is afraid of rejection is avoiding the process by saying “That job is not suitable for me” instead of going through the interview process and the fact that a candidate who has a desire to have experience (despite the possibility of the interview result is negative) to try him / herself is interviewed.
It is important to ask, but our driving force is faith. As our belief in ourselves decreases, our intensity to feel negative emotions increases. There is a difference between playing to win and not to lose.
It is important to increase our individual awareness in order to increase our confidence and belief in ourselves. Exploring our strengths and improvements is the first step in this process.
One condition to be positive about life is to activate our inner motivation. Motivation is not a phenomenon that constantly feeds from outside. “What motivates me?”, “Who am I, what is my personality and character, what are my expectations, goals and objectives?” Answering questions are one of the most important tools for us to discover ourselves and overcome negative emotions.
Always remember, remind yourself. Life is not lived with regret from the past and anxiety about the future. Learn from your experience, take your importance and believe in yourself to avoid experiencing the same problems over and over. Then, your negative feelings are not you, but you can manage them and continue your way by getting stronger from the difficulties experienced. Then you can say, “I am fine, I am pleasant, amused” with a big smile on your face. So take a deep breath with a smile now, because you can, or on the contrary, say, “This is what I can do, every challenge will find me.” The choice is yours.