Get control of how you react to events in your life

Control is something we all want. People want to control other people, situations, and events, to name a few. However, in reality, the only thing you can really control is yourself, to be more precise, your thoughts.

When we try to control other people, we cause conflict, discomfort, and pain, both to the other person and to ourselves. The thing about the control we desperately crave is that we all seek to control external factors, in the faint hope that we can gain some control in our own lives.

There are really only three main emotions:

• Love (including happiness, peace, etc.)
• Anger (including hate, unhappiness, etc.)
• Fear (including uncertainty, dread, etc.)

All our feelings are a combination of these emotions. Love draws you towards something; Anger creates conflict and ultimately confronts you with something, while fear scares you away from things. By controlling (or trying to control) external factors, we are really only trying to reduce anger and fear, while increasing love and all the emotions related to it.

The good news is that it is easier to control everything by controlling your thoughts. There is an important point to remember, to remind you that you are in control:

• Every event or situation that happens in your life is neither good nor bad, it is just an event or situation.

It is our interpretation of the event or situation that we CAN control. The event itself does not cause you to feel the good or bad emotions, it is your REACTION to the event that does.

Let’s see an example: you lose your job. Now, if you loved your job, got along with your boss, and spent time with him, you will naturally feel annoyed; however, if you hated the job, you’ll probably be relieved or happy!

By looking for the positive in any given event and situation, you can change them to be to your benefit in some way. If someone yells at you, you can decide whether or not to get angry. Maybe they had a bad day, maybe they remind you of how you don’t want to be and maybe you did something to hurt them; it is your choice how to react.

Changing the way you act in any given situation or event really depends on you changing your attitude towards them. Take a second to take a deep, slow breath before you react, to give yourself time to decide how you really want to react. Too often, we allow our subconscious to decide how we react to a given situation; that’s why you feel out of control, so take back control by deciding to control how you react!