Are your emotions taking the better of you away from you? Maybe anger flares up at small things, sadness lingers longer than it should, or anxiety keeps you stuck. What would it mean for you to finally take control of your emotional responses instead of being controlled by your emotions?

Here’s a simple NLP-based exercise you can use to positively shift your emotional patterns so you can respond calmly and confidently.

Recognize the signs

Your emotions are driving you, if you find your mood swinging without warning, you react without thinking or feel drained after interacting with others. When this happens, you may feel like life is happening to you, rather than you directing your life.

You are more than your emotions!

Over the last 3 decades that I have been coaching people, I have seen countless people who – when it comes to emotions say, “I am angry” or “I am sad” or “I am anxious” On the other hand, they never say, “I am a headache” or “I am fever” when they have a physical issue. The reason is we tend to overlook the fact that like any physical issue; we humans have emotional issues too.

Remember, you are not your emotions; you are the one who experiences emotions!

Change your emotional responses with this NLP technique

Before you do this process, let me remind you of something familiar. You’ve clicked on your mobile and opened apps thousands of times. You know how a small icon expands, gets big, and completely covers the screen. This NLP technique works in a very similar way.

Close your eyes and make a large, bright, colored image of the situation in which you experience the emotion. Set it aside for a moment.

Now, imagine yourself already in control of your emotions, having all the choices you want in life. Make this image totally compelling.

Take the large bright emotional image and place a small dark image of your desired state in the lower left-hand corner. Then, very quickly, make the small dark image springs up, grows, become colored and bright. Let the unwanted image fade in the background. Repeat this process at least 5 times in a row.

With practice, this SWISH pattern rewires your emotional responses, giving you the freedom to act with clarity and confidence. If you want deeper guidance to permanently shift your emotional patterns, you can explore my coaching by clicking here.