Oscillating with your Emotions? Learn the Art of Emotional Regulation!

Happy, Sad, Angry, Jealous, Disgusted, Contented, Disappointed, Embarrassed, Rejected, Confused, Amazed - Which of these emotions are you experiencing right now?

As human beings, each one of us goes through a range of emotions on a daily basis. When you woke up today morning, you may have felt tired to begin the day, after having your breakfast you may have felt energized, on an office zoom call, you forgot meeting a client deadline and got scolded by your boss in front of everyone which made you feel embarrassed, in the evening, the pizza delivery guy forgot bringing your favourite garlic breadsticks which made you feel angry, in the night, your friend decided to surprise you by sending some gifts from amazon, which left you feeling happy.

 

Emotions are what makes us uniquely human. It helps you communicate, shapes your behaviour and build meaningful relationships. Yet, somehow, most of us don't experience the full range of our emotions. In my experience as a psychologist, I have seen two opposing variations in how people experience emotions. Either they deny certain emotions, numb themselves of emotional experience or engage in distraction techniques so as to not experience emotions or they experience emotions in an uncontrolled manner so much so that it begins interfering with their work, relationships and cause a generic dysfunction. This is especially true for emotions that leave us feeling negative.

 

So, why does it become important to effectively regulate your emotions?

Emotions are the driving factor behind our actions. If we don't invest time in learning how to drive a car and suddenly jump behind the wheels, it is bound to cause accidents. We as a society are more focussed on the intellectual development of children and not on socio-emotional development. This, I believe is also one reason as to why India is experiencing such high rates of Depression. Many people out there don't have the knowledge of emotions, how to experience them and the right tools to regulate them.

Emotional regulation refers to the process by which individuals influence which emotions they have, when they have them, and how they experience and express their feelings. Emotional regulation can be automatic or controlled, conscious or unconscious, and may have effects at one or more points in the emotion producing process (Gross et al, 1988).

The skill of emotion regulation helps us modulate responses triggered by emotions, helps us focus on important pieces of information and filter out the suited emotional response. The tools help you develop a higher Emotional Quotient, self-control and increase self-awareness. As social beings, we encounter different stimuli in our environment that provoke an upsurge of emotions. Emotional regulation as an ability helps you actively monitor the situation, judge, reason and then decide a response. 

Basics to Building Emotional Regulation -

1. Emotional Literacy: Researching and knowing about different emotion words so as to adequately label a particularly emotional experience is the most basic step. This step is especially important for children, developing a rich emotions vocabulary at a young age goes a long way. 
2. Observation: One of the first steps to regulating emotions is noticing and labelling emotions. Understanding our triggers, stimuli, situations that evoke a certain emotional response. This should be a judgement-free observation that helps increase one's own awareness of emotions. 
3. Delaying Response Time: This step is to realize which emotions have an overpowering impact on us and can trigger negative consequences. For example - Once you have realized that whenever you feel angry, you somehow feel out of control and displace your emotions onto someone either by shouting, behaving in a rude manner or by breaking things. You can use this knowledge to delay your response time. The next time you feel angry, pause for a moment, take some deep breaths and then an action. 
4. Deep Breathing: Practice the 4-7-8 breathing technique wherein you take a deep breath for 4 seconds, hold it in for 7 seconds and then exhale for 8 seconds. Every time you experience a surge of emotions, this technique will help you delay your reaction. 
5.  Re-appraisal: More often than not, all of us are conditioned to respond in a certain manner to a particular stimulus. For example- having a fight with a best friend will leave us angry or sad in most instances. Re-appraisal basically means a re-evaluation of the situation and the response we have to it. This is a cognitive skill that can be beneficial for the long term well being as well. 
6. Self-Compassion: Being mindful to be compassionate and forgiving to your own self when experiencing negative emotions. It takes time and effort to become aware of and regulate emotions. Ensure that you are standing by and not against yourself in the process.

It may be difficult to pause the natural, learned process of expressing one's own emotions. It is somewhere the fault of our society, our education system, wherein we fail to justify the importance of emotions and the role it plays in our life. Becoming aware of one's emotions is one of the most important aspects of self-awareness and wellbeing. 

References -

Gross and Thompson,(2007): Emotion regulation: Conceptual foundations.

Long Term Impact of Burnout & Prevention Techniques!

Burnout is the state of complete physical, emotional and mental exhaustion caused due to constant stressors leading to decreased motivation, lowered performance and a negative perspective of life. 

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay 

Signs of Burnout-

1. Extreme Fatigue to a point that simple day to day activities begin feeling difficult. 
2. Cynicism or a pessimistic outlook especially towards one's job.
3. A sense of apathy about everyday happenings of life. 
4. Leading a life with a general state of hopelessness & helplessness. 
5. Emotional Unavailability as seen in the form of ignoring friends phone calls etc. 
6. Difficulty in emotional regulation.
7. A sudden lack of empathy. 
8. Irritability or snapping out on minor inconveniences. 
9. A sense of ineffectiveness and lack of accomplishment.
10. Inability to concentrate, problem-solve, increased indecisiveness and reduced cognitive flexibility.

Burnout is associated with the overwhelming demand of a job which outstrips a person's ability to cope with the stress. World Health Organisation (WHO) in their comprehensive report on psychosocial stress emphasized that burnout is caused by high demand, low control, imbalanced effort-reward work environment. A permanent state of exhaustion can deplete a person of their mental and physical resources eventually causing physical illness, auto-immune disorder, depression, anxiety and in extreme cases even death. 

A study conducted on the neuro-cognitive impact of burnout found that participants who were highly stressed and experiencing a state of exhaustion showed an enlarged amygdala (area of the brain responsible for emotional reaction) and poor neural linkages between the amygdala and the anterior cingulate cortex & medial prefrontal cortex (area of the prefrontal cortex responsible for decision making and other cognitive activities). There are very high cognitive costs of burnout. Multiple pieces of research have demonstrated the changes in brain structure and impact on creativity, problem-solving and working memory due to burnout. 

Preventing Burnout -

1. One of the first steps to prevent burnout is to realize you are going through it. Observe and notice the signs of burnout. Don't ignore the signs of stress. 
2. Prioritizing self-care 
• 8 hours of regular sleep, proper nutritious diet, exercising - to ensure that your body remains replenished of fuels required for facing tough times.
• Making scheduled time for hobbies
• Making it a point to connect with friends, family or do volunteer, community service
• Trying out guided meditation (App recommendation: Insight timer, Headspace, Calm)
• Positive Affirmations
• Journaling (https://psychcentral.com/lib/the-health-benefits-of-journaling#1) 
• Trying Psychotherapy
3. If you feel like you don't have enough time for self-care, try to understand where your time apart from work is being spent. In times of burnout, it can be crucial to limit wasting free time and devoting it to self-care.
4. Unreasonable time pressure, lack of clarity of role, non-supportive management, unfair treatment at work may lead to excessive pressure, it is advisable to talk to superiors about its impact on your health and seeking help to manage workload. 
5. Try seeking the help of work mentors, role models or colleagues who can understand the pressure and guide you through a tough time. 
6. Activities like travelling, going out for social engagements can provide temporary reliefs but for long term prevention of burnout, you should engage in regularly scheduled work breaks. 

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay 

Sometimes, it's difficult to prevent burnout especially when the job causing the exhaustion is your only source of financial stability or in cases of sudden emergencies like during the beginning of the pandemic, most doctors did not have an option but to work in a state of constant exhaustion. During such time, it becomes important to realise that situation is out-of-control and have a strong self-care mechanism in place in order to protect oneself from the long term negative impact of burnout. Stress is a given of professional life, but extreme, unpredictable and unrelenting stress can have significant damaging effects on physical and mental health. 

Some important resources-

https://www.psychologicalscience.org/observer/burnout-and-the-brain

https://hbr.org/2016/11/beating-burnout

Anger: A Misunderstood Emotion in the Indian Society

 Anger is an emotion that is expressed as a result of frustration of needs, goals or the feeling of being wronged by someone or something. 

Anger is a misunderstood emotion in India. Most people are not able to understand that anger, like happiness, is an emotion. More often than not, our society teaches us to take offence when someone expresses their anger. In my work as a school psychologist, I often observed that when a student expressed their anger towards a teacher, s/he was labelled as being disrespectful to elders. Soon enough, every teacher in the school would assume that the student is aggressive and to not allow him/her to express any opinions in the classroom. Knowingly or unknowingly, the teachers have developed an impression of this student based on one solitary experience and generalized it to an extent that 'being disrespectful' has become all that the child represents for them. 

We as a society need to learn how to detach anger from disrespect. Anger is an emotion expressed when someone is hurt. If we are not giving our children the space to express their anger, they will soon learn to repress it. If repressing of emotions becomes a pattern it might show up in the form of frequent uncontrollable outbursts of emotions sometime in the future. Children not only learn how to react in a certain manner through role modelling of adults but also learn the expected reactions to certain emotions. Ultimately, we are raising more intolerant individuals.

Expressing Anger ≠ disrespect.

Emotions, whether they make us sad, angry, fearful or happy are important to experience. Emotions are what makes us human beings. We need to help people learn how to express different emotions. When we feel happy, we want to share the thing that made us happy with everyone. If anger makes you want to punch, push, argue with the person or thing that made you angry - think about how it would help you? Emotions have a tendency of engulfing you just like ocean waves. When we experience emotions at a stronger intensity, they can have unpredictable consequences. In order to have a richer emotional experience, we need to understand what each emotion makes us feel and what are our usual patterns of reaction. To enable this learning every school in India should include lessons on socio-emotional learning and raise more self-aware individuals. Understanding the origin of a particular behaviour and learning to appreciate beauty emotions is essential for our own well-being.