One of my 2017 resolutions was to read one book every month and for the month of August, it was “The Happiness Project” by Gretchen Rubin. Really loved the structure how she made 10 commandments to add more happiness to her existing life. How she pursued towards achieving it breaking into sub goals for every month.
Among all, I really liked her commandment “Act the way I want to feel”. As I read it I began self-analyzing into daily life’s trivial tasks and how our responses actually make us think & feel a particular way. We have learned it that we act in a specific way because of how we feel. But contrary to this it’s our actions at times that makes us feel the way we are.
Accordingly, I decided to keep the note of this rule to see how it goes if I control the way I act. I started taking baby steps toward this. Every time an undesired feeling in a situation would hit me I would ignore and act the way I wanted to feel at that point of time rather than situation dictating me how to feel. It was great to govern the way I wanted the outcome to make me feel.
Though this helped me every day becoming a regulator of how I wanted to feel in a situation or a day. This example I’m sharing ahead just tells about how one time it helped me control the way I wanted to act not to have any remorseful feelings which will trigger a series of reaction once my mood is off the radar.
The other day I went to a gathering where I was into a conversation with a group of people who had very strong opinions about their perspectives of “How working mothers are not emotionally close to kids as compared to stay at home Moms” ? and were not willing to listen to someone with an open mind. Routinely this situation would frustrate me and I would go about explaining my perspective in an assertive voice or may be shaking their opinions. But I wanted to act on the principle I was living “Act the way I want to FEEL”. I didn’t want to feel frustrated or agitated at the end of the evening with these closed-minded people. I didn’t even know them before so their opinions didn’t even matter to me. Even if I proved my point, there was a rare chance that I would see them again. And the fact was that I was there to enjoy food not to win a debate.
Hence, I decided that what I believe in or what’s my point of view has nothing to do with them. Instead of being part of the convo and having an urge to say what I feel and being unfulfilled; I chose to stay quiet and enjoy food rather than picking a party to be discussing pros and cons of being a working MOM. My personal value of being a self-pleaser instead of being a people pleaser also aligned with what I did at that time. I finished my food and moved towards the dessert section picking up on a small talk with a complete stranger instead of going through the agony of negative people perspectives that evening.
I am sure not every day we wake up with the beaming smile or high energy but if we don’t pick up our mood ourselves we are inviting the feelings that will ruin our day and the days of people attached to us. And I am sure no one wants to feel down without a reason. So, Smile, Walk Straight, keep your head High, Get up, Dress Up! and you will feel the way you want to feel. It’s in your own hands!!!
What do you think about it?
