This Is How To Have Emotionally Intelligent Relationships: 4 Secrets - Barking Up The Wrong Tree

This is when you respond as you normally respond but instead, this time you need to do something different.

All you have to do right now is... Nothing. Don't do the bad thing. Just stop. Observe what's going on in your brain.

Defuse

• Do not engage the thoughts; observe and label them to get some distance.
• Reframe the thought: "If I don’t give in, they’ll hate me."
• Respond: “Thank you, Mind.”

Identify: Find your fatal flaw. Whether it’s hostility, withdrawal, compliance or whatever, identify that bad social habit that always causes you grief.

The Moment of Choice: Next time you reflexively want to engage in that bad coping behaviour, all you have to do is nothing. There’s a moment of choice in there, shimmering. You can choose to do something else.

You’re not the weather; you’re the sky.

Defuse: When the thoughts and fears run rampant through your head just say, “Thank you, Mind.” Those thoughts are advisors, not dictators. Then choose to act on your values.