The single most powerful change you can make in the New Year is to learn how to shift your emotions instantaneously.
This is what has been labeled as part of The Shift, and can even be considered a bit of a trick, or technique to change your vibration on a dime into something less stressful, more comfortable, and more empowered. Just think: if you weren’t at the mercy of some of your own negative emotionality, and if you felt you were in charge of your personal drama, how elevating life would suddenly feel! You’d find yourself the Master of Ceremonies in your own theater, or the director of your own action-adventure.
Before you can truly partake of the great shift in consciousness that’s approaching in this new age, you have to internalize certain methods. And it’s not really very hard to do. It’s one thing to spout slogans about changing your reality by changing your thoughts, or awakening to a brand new era in human evolution, but it’s quite another – and very challenging – thing to alter your own daily process, and leverage yourself out of any habitual despair or tailspin.
That’s where true mastery lies, and that’s really how the world is going to change from this point on. Switching emotions is a powerful key to a better life, a happier day-to-day existence, and a sense of greater control.
How do you do this?
First, you have to recognize when you’ve slipped into the dark feelings: anger, sadness, gloom, anxiety, frustration, and all those other ugly sprites that hover around you. You have to stop your train of thoughts just long enough to label what you’re going through. Give it a name. If it’s named, you can work with it; if it’s vague and free-floating, you can’t. You’re stuck.
Now that you’ve named it, use a part of yourself called The Observer to detach and step aside, and watch your train of thoughts as you plow through this gray place, this sorry storyline. What are you saying to yourself second by second, minute by minute? It’s no easy feat to be the participant in the drama and at the very same time be the observer or audience. But the good news is, it’s do-able.
Once you’ve found the way to name your current emotion and observe your trail of accompanying thoughts, tell yourself to stop. Cut! Cancel-cancel! Abort! Can I say it any clearer? You have just put on the brakes, brought the trainwreck to a halt, and neutralized some churning chemicals coursing through your system. Now’s the time to do the shift. Simply switch gears. At that instant, start telling yourself a different story. Reframe. Revise. Change the script.
What’s a better story?
It’s your drama; you have control. What else is happening that might have a bright side?
We were on the turnpike over the holiday weekend – the weather was awful, the traffic was intense, and we got into a minor car accident where the fender was scuffed. We went through all the motions of stopping, discussing with the other driver, reaching the conclusion that the situation stunk but didn’t warrant dealing with the insurance company. But I told myself a different story: I said maybe that little side-swipe preempted a major accident; maybe it was a token event rather than a huge crash; maybe we got by without a bigger disaster. You see, I reframed the event to my own satisfaction. And who’s to say which reality is the truer?
You can do this, and then you’re truly doing The Shift. Once you do it successfully, you’ve got it! You figured out how. Then the trick is to sustain it, and do it again and again. This will change your world; it will lighten your life. And guaranteed, it will cause you to be happier because it’s what you’re choosing, not what has been dumped upon you.
Happy New Year, everyone!
Judi Thomases is a contributing blogger for JenningsWire, a blogging community created by Annie Jennings.
