Our Emotions and the Election

My daughter cried the morning of November 11, 2016 when I told her Donald Trump was going to be president.  She was upset by the news she heard about him misbehaving around women, and was afraid to have him as president. 

I tried to be measured in how to explain to her to be effective with responding to creating change.  She wanted to move to Britain.  I explained that running away from our scary feelings is not the best way to deal with them.  Sometimes we need to face our feelings.

How can we deal with our negative feelings of fear as they arise? Instead of telling my daughter to stop feeling a certain way, I entertained her idea of running from this presidency.  Moving would be difficult.  We would have to put our pets in quarantine, get visas, jobs, and housing.  That might be more difficult than signing a petition and voting, or protecting ourselves and others from difficulty.

I then honored her feelings as useful information.  I explained that any man who talks about women the way he does or walks into dressing rooms, should be avoided.  Her emotions led us to a discussion of which situations she should engage with and which ones she should avoid. 

I explained her feelings, and my feelings can motivate us to be the change we want to see in this country.

As a parent, I realize that these emotions are warning signs we need to listen to and prepare ourselves for.  There is a purpose for emotions, and these emotions tell us about our values.  I explained this to my daughter and she felt proud of her feelings, and now I hope she will listen to her feelings in the future.

Turning Obstacles into Opportunity as Pennebaker Did

Dealing with grief, anger, or sadness does not come easy to anyone. James Pennebaker, an accomplished professor at the University of Texas came up with a way to deal with anger by writing it down.  His research inspired me when  found that people who wrote out their worries tended to cope better. There are so many ways to handle anger that I have tried lately.  Anger is the fire that burns us to make us shine through adversity.  It is like the fire in a kiln.  We can put the glaze of experience on our pot of life, but until we are put through the fire of life we do not shine.  It is that going forth and coming back again that makes us look all shiny and new again just like my daughter when she comes out of her fever. Her fever always makes her looks all toasty shiny and new again. 

If everyone could cope with anger naturally as we rid germs with fevers, the world would be better. I believe our anger is part of life, just as germs are.  There are people, things, and experiences that draw forth anger.  They are inevitable.  It is how we deal with this anger that matters.  Having the space between the feeling we feel, and the action we do, to cope with  feelings allow us to pick the best strategy to move forward in our lives and come out the other end of the adversity tunnel shiny and new again.

Often when life is in disarray we may feel confused and angry.  In cases like these we need clarity.  Pour a glass of water and sit and meditate for three to five days next to the water giving it our intention for clarity.  After we sit for a time of 10 minutes or more pour the water out into the ground.

When we are clear we may still be angry at the situation.  Then it is time to fight fire with fire.  Wake before all others in your household.  Get a sheet of paper.  Write all the things you are angry about on that paper.  Then, crumple up the paper and light it on fire outside.  Make sure it is in a metal or ceramic bowl that is not important to you.  After writing for a week you will feel less angry.  The ashes will still be there.  Bury them in a place that brings you peace.

After this is done go on a walk and breathe deeply for seven days.  Breathe in for ten counts and then exhale for ten counts.  Then stop for a second and think to yourself “I accept my life as it is and wish to live my life to its fullest.”  Allow positive new thoughts in and allow the painful sad thoughts to be.  The object of this exercise is not to get rid of unhappiness.  The idea is to allow the reality of the issue to set into your life.  

Acknowledging Feelings and Emotional Agility

Children experience grief but lack the coping skills to guide them through these difficult moments. Susan David Ph.D. the visionary behind Emotional Agility. says "When we show up fully, with awareness and acceptance, even the worst demons back down. Simply by facing up to the scary things and giving them a name, we oftewn strip them of their power." This is the core of what my Emotatude series is about.  My Emotatude series strives to give our feelings names and even paint pictures of what they look like.  I have done this to help my family and ultimately myself cope.  We really can't control how many emotional experiences we will have.  We can control how we will deal with them.  Do we hold things in?  Do we go over them in our mind over and over again? Or, do we accept situations and embrace them with all our being.  That is what Susan David calls "showing up." This is what I am working on personally, and what my books are trying to work on too. Right now I am working on my sixth book Gregory Deals with Grief. I hope that it will be as enlightening as Crandle's Conniptions, The Secret of Warm Fuzzies, How to be Heebie Jeebie Free, and What to do When you Get the Bejeebers Scared Out of You. I revere Susan for her deep research in these matters that I am savoring chapter by chapter.  They feed my spirit and give me new direction in my writing.

Motivation and Values Can Match Your Way Forward Through Emotional Agility

The book Emotional Agility by Susan David is an awesome read for parents. She cuts through our frenetic world and really gets into the inborn jungle inside of us where it is really easy to get lost in our powerful emotions.  She takes the whole idea of 'getting out of your own way' to a new level of understanding. 

Her ideas hit home as she points out that a person with emotional agility can be in the moment and behave in ways that match what they want and what they believe in.  When I think about the countless times in my life I have reacted to events in my life because of my emotions, I settle to think how things might have gone differently if I had acted out of a sense of my core values and desires.

Her work motivates me to continue to make new discoveries about my series of 'Emotatude' books where the main character Dr. Kich a famous ‘Emotatude’ doctor helps children understand their emotions. This character explores feelings as concrete beings that lie deep inside all of us. He has provided an invaluable service to children and adults everywhere who struggle with ways to explain just how they feel and what they are feeling.

When I think about Crandle the latest character in book 5 who experienced conniption fits, I hope that the window into his fictional world will help real children act out of a sense of their core values and desires as Crandle has.  I invite any readers with ideas for new Emotatudes to contact me at Karenwporter.com to let me know how we can explore new worlds where emotions are there for us in their native raw state, not needing to be conquered, but understood.

Emotional Agility

Just when I thought I was really "in touch" emotionally,  I have been awakened to the idea that there is more for me to discover about emotion.  I took the free quiz Susan David has provided to promote her new book, Emotional Agility.   I now realize I want to train myself to come to my inner world -  thoughts, emotions, experiences and self-stories - with courage, compassion and curiosity. So often I let my emotions get in my way.  This book looks like it will give us insight into how to learn from our emotions.  This is my mantra in writing my Emotatude series.  I want to be so skilled at feeling that I will be able to spring back from any emotional devastation I feel and evaluate the situations I face with a clear mind.  I want to always be able to move forward with values and purpose. This book " a critical skillset that helps you make real changes in your life, both
at work and at home." It has a four-part process to help you make these changes that are
"organized into those four parts: Showing Up, Stepping Out, Walking Your Why, and Moving On."
 I am going to give it a try and let you know how it goes.  Perhaps I will have tips for coping with our Bejeebers, Heebiejeebies, Conniptions, Cases of Grief and more.

Emotional Agility

Just when I thought I was really "in touch" emotionally,  I have been awakened to the idea that there is more for me to discover about emotion.  I took the free quiz Susan David has provided to promote her new book, Emotional Agility.   I now realize I want to train myself to come to my inner world -  thoughts, emotions, experiences and self-stories - with courage, compassion and curiosity. So often I let my emotions get in my way.  This book looks like it will give us insight into how to learn from our emotions.  This is my mantra in writing my Emotatude series.  I want to be so skilled at feeling that I will be able to spring back from any emotional devastation I feel and evaluate the situations I face with a clear mind.  I want to always be able to move forward with values and purpose. This book " a critical skillset that helps you make real changes in your life, both
at work and at home." It has a four-part process to help you make these changes that are
"organized into those four parts: Showing Up, Stepping Out, Walking Your Why, and Moving On."
 I am going to give it a try and let you know how it goes.  Perhaps I will have tips for coping with our Bejeebers, Heebiejeebies, Conniptions, Cases of Grief and more.

Crazy Cranky Crandle Could Quit His Conniptions!

Poor Crandle got himself expelled from school because he was not capable of self regulation.  He was incapable of managing his impulse control as well as his distressing feelings.  It is hard to work on our emotional centers at the same time as our brain is telling us to fight or flee.  We need to practice how to have:

1. Self- Control: so we can manage emotions that disrupt normal behavior.

2. Trustworthiness: so we can be honest

3, Conscientiousness : So others can depend on us

4. Adaptability: So we can function in many different types of situations

5. Innovation: So we can be open to new situations


Read my book about Crandle's Conniptions and you will begin to think about what he could have done to prevent himself from acting out the way he did.  Cranky Crandle's Crazy Conniptions: How to Deal with Conniption Fits  shows us what can happen if you are not in control of your feelings.  Daniel Goleman's book Working with Emotional Intelligence gives parents some insight and strategies for controlling your emotions.

Please visit
https://www.amazon.com/Cranky-Crandles-Crazy-Conniptions-Conniption/dp/1532871341/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1474038599&sr=1-1&keywords=Crandle

If you would like to buy my latest Emotatude Book.