“One Emotion Leads to Another” by Harsha Ravindran (2016)

I had just finished writing a long and windy paragraph online and I was about to hit the save button when the WiFi crashed, deleting my progress in the process. “Oh great, now I have to re-do it!” I thought to myself. And so I did. And luckily, the second time my WiFi crashed, I was more prepared and managed to find a way to save my progress.

So what did I learn from this situation? Other than the fact that I need to get a more stable WiFi connection, I realized that my Mind was trying to frustrate me until I gave up. How did I come to this conclusion? You see, this isn’t the first time that this exact situation has happened to me. But mostly, it ends with me getting annoyed with my laptop/ the WiFi/ my document/ etc.… and I would end up giving up on the task that I was working on. 

It’s another infamous trick of the Subconscious Mind to get you so frustrated, so annoyed, that you’d surrender and give up on what you’re doing. This typical obstacle can come in the form of people, situations, or things. Basically, anything that can evoke negative emotions of stress within you.

And here’s the funny thing about emotions like stress and frustration; they actually open the door for all the other negative emotions and situations to come in. Like in the earlier example, if I had gotten frustrated, I would want to give up, feeling angry at the WiFi. And the next time I would want to do some other task, I would be demotivated. And even if I don’t exactly remember the original reason why I don’t want to do that task, my emotions would strongly rebel against doing the task and I would end up procrastinating from doing it.

I know it might seem a bit extreme, especially since the whole situation is just because of a loose WiFi connection, but it’s the little emotions, the little drops of frustration that build up over time which grow and manifest into the other extreme emotions. 

Here’s another example, you’re upset but you don’t tell anyone. Maybe you’re annoyed at someone, a friend, parent, sibling, coworker, or classmate, whoever it is. At first it’s just because they made an annoying comment or something, but eventually you will notice that everything about them screams irritating. From one small incident where you were probably annoyed with that person, now he/she might even seem like your worst enemy!

Scary isn’t it?

So the only way to stop these emotions from turning into some creepy monstrosity of emotions would be to express them in the early stages itself. When someone does something that annoys you, tell them right away, use diplomacy and I’m sure if you do it right, they’ll be okay with it. 

If you’re frustrated with your laptop or WiFi connection, find a solution to solve the problem and do S.I.E.P.! Remind yourself that the obstacle you are facing is just a small, tiny little bump on the road that leads you to your success. Clear out your stress and frustration, right there, right then! Go punch a wall or drink some tea if you can’t solve the problem while you’re frustrated but come back later to think of a solution.

Remember, if you express yourself, and clear out how you feel, you are basically shining light onto the seed of these negative emotions, thus making sure they can’t grow into something else. You take away their ability to turn and grow into scarier, more complex emotions and make yourself feel better. 

So learn how to clear your emotions as quick as you can and stop the chances of them turning into unrelated, unneeded problems and emotions. Good Luck!

– Harsha

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