Can you control your emotions? It’s a very valuable skill to have, especially in relationships. Because couples who tend to flare up during an argument, often part.
Psychologists call it ‘emotional regulation,’ and it’s not easy to learn. Life’s full of tiresome irritations that test our tempers, and once your feelings are running high, it’s easy to get angry and push logic aside.
Anger’s important, and useful for dealing with physical threats. But it really gets in the way in relationships!
Plenty of couples do manage to stay calm under pressure though, and they’re usually the ones who stay together.
The key’s learning to be aware of your emotions, rather than being swept up by them. Because calm people feel exactly the same pressures as the rest of us.
It’s the way they respond that’s different. They interrupt their instinctive fight response and observe their emotions, rather than being driven along by them.
So it really does help to pause before shouting at someone! That short delay is all it takes to help you stand back from your feelings.
As does persuading yourself to think of the incident from your partner’s point of view rather than yours. Or doing something a bit different, like touching your partner, or smiling, instead of getting riled up by them.
That doesn’t mean you should suppress your emotions. If you’ve been offended, it’s natural to be annoyed. And repressing your annoyance means that problems can lie simmering for years. Only to cause serious difficulties when something unexpected happens.
In fact marriages where issues aren’t addressed often end suddenly, during some minor crisis. Because the couple haven’t learnt how to manage their feelings constructively.
You can start to learn those skills by thinking about your moods and figuring out what triggers them. Before long you’ll find you can control your reactions.
That’s because actively observing your emotions changes the way your brain processes your feelings. It reduces the activity of the emotional parts of the brain and boosts the areas which control the way you respond to stress.
It’s also what lies behind the Buddhist technique of ‘noting’ an emotion without trying to change it. In fact religious people are generally more self-controlled, because prayer and meditation activate the parts of the brain involved in self-regulation.
Visualisation, also called ‘image rehearsal,’ is another good way to keep your emotions in check. It works because vividly imagined images trigger exactly the same emotional and physical responses as real ones, even though they’re not actually there. So visualising being in control will help calm you down, even when there’s lots happening to wind you up.
Rehearsing cool-headed approaches to conflict also helps. So for example, practice seeing your partner’s anger as a cry for help, rather than thinking ‘You can’t talk to me like that!’
Learning to stay calm is good as it helps reduce your stress levels. But someday it may even save your marriage.