Internal Control

I had been feeling pretty upset lately due to factors beyond my control at work and at home.  I was letting it effect my mood, my health, and my attitude.  I think my husband was at his wit's end trying to figure out how to help me, and I know I wasn't very pleasant to be around.  Last week I decided I needed to stop and take stock of the situation.

I work with some challenging people at my job (don't we all?).  They aren't going to stop being challenging just because it's upsetting to me.  It doesn't actually help anything to get worked up, and probably just makes things worse.  I realized that my happiness can't depend on things going the way I want them to.  I have to figure out how to be happy regardless of what's going on around me.  I tell my children all the time you can only control yourself, and it's fine to feel emotions, but you still control your reactions.  It's so much easier to give advice than it is to heed it!

Now obviously it's much easier to tell oneself that it doesn't do any good to get upset by factors beyond our control (especially other people), than it is to not get upset.  It takes work, effort and constant reminders.  It is worth it though, when I find reasons to be happy regardless of what is happening externally.  It also affords me more energy for being a mom, which makes me happier, so I start a positive cycle instead of being stuck in that vicious, negative cycle of unhappiness.

I wish I was one of those people who didn't ever let things get to me, but I'm just not.  I have way to much of my dad in me to be able to just ignore problems when I see them, even when, or maybe especially when, I can't do anything to fix them.  So just telling myself that I shouldn't let things bother me doesn't work long-term.  What I have found to be working is reminding myself that I'm making the choices that are right for me.  I have to define success for myself, and stop apologizing for my choices.  I enjoy my work and have to support my family.  My definition of success at work is doing interesting and challenging work that contributes to something larger than myself, and making enough money to support my family.  My definition of success does not include a fancy title and more responsibility.  So when I make choices to work hard and get my work done, then get home to be with my family, that is a conscious choice I'm making and I don't need to feel badly about it.  I've found that if I remind myself why I'm making the choices I am, and how said choices work in my life, that it's easier to let go of the negative emotions.  It's easier to feel good about what I'm doing and in turn to feel happy.

I'm sure this will be a cycle, and that I'll have my low times again (over and over and over...)  I don't think I've magically figured out how to change a life-time of learned habits supported by genetics.  I do think I'm making steps to choose my course forward again, instead of feeling like things are just happening to me.  I suppose in some ways it's nice not to have everything figured out by the time we're 18, it allows us to keep growing and learning, which I very much enjoy.

This new approach will also hopefully allow me to really refocus my efforts to get healthier and lose about 15 pounds.  I've been using food as a crutch to deal with my emotions so I haven't been able to sustain any progress on that front.  Now that I'm attempting to take control of my emotions again, I should be able to stop using food in that manner.

So here goes, I'll keep you posted on my results!