18 Emotional Regulation skills to learn to reverse negative emotions and find peace

We're still not used to thinking about it, but getting control of our emotions is possible for everyone and convenient.

However, it is good to remember that there are different ways to do it, and not all of them have positive effects in the long run. For example, drinking or abusing substances immediately affects our emotions, but the negative implications would be more significant in the long term.

Before discovering how to control your emotions, we want to underline the importance of not suppressing them. Emotions must not be denied; on the contrary, they must be accepted because they certainly have an origin.

For this reason, staying in touch with them is always good to understand how to continue to take care of yourself, possibly by contacting a specialist.

Awareness of one's emotions is the first step towards improvement and control.

Knowing what you are feeling at the moment you think makes it easier for you to work on yourself.

Thinking you can constantly improve helps the fact of succeeding. So if we believe we can change our thoughts and emotions, we will learn to do it over time.

Feeling and expressing gratitude towards life and others will make us and the people close to us feel good. Gratitude is said to be the key to happiness. Try keeping a journal where you write down what you are grateful for every night, and you will see your life change.

Just as focusing on negative thoughts and anxieties, and fears generate negative feelings, thinking about pleasant situations or favorable future scenarios creates positive emotions and moods.

In Eastern philosophy, thoughts, and emotions are compared to ocean waves. They are, therefore, phenomena that are constantly changing. So we should give them only minor importance. If we can accept our emotions without judging them and without feeding them with our thoughts, they will leave us faster than we think.

This is the name of the art of seeing the positive, even in the negative, because it never fails. For example, suppose we lost our job. Thinking that everything will go wrong will generate negative emotions. On the contrary, re-evaluating this fact as the possibility of better professional fulfillment will help us feel better and make this happen.

This mechanism involves re-evaluating a negative experience as favorable. Let's take again the case of having lost your job. Thinking, for example, that this will also mean no longer having to deal with a manager we don't like or with hostile colleagues will help to change one's point of view. And then your emotions.

Sharing your positive emotions with others helps to strengthen them and extend their effect. When you experience something positive, share it with a message or a call, without vanity but with sincerity.

Memorizing and remembering positive words helps activate those areas of the brain related to positive concepts and ideas. Doing it consistently strengthens the brain when switching from negative to positive moods.

When going through negative emotions, one way to get out of negative feelings is to focus on the positive aspects of a situation. Attention can (and should) be trained.

Remembering that negative feelings are destined to pass, we realize how little they will have disappeared later in time. This mechanism speeds up this change.

When we go through positive feelings, we try to live fully, savoring and celebrating them. Too often, we let them go unnoticed. By reinforcing this habit, it will be easier and easier to recall positive feelings when we need them most.

When we are going through negative emotions, distancing ourselves from them is a good strategy. There is an excellent chance that negative feelings will change by trying to see yourself from the outside as if you were a fly and thus evaluating the situation from a greater distance.

Controlling your breathing or focusing your attention on certain parts of your body, which is what Mindfulness teaches, can calm the stormy sea of our emotions.

When negative actions pervade us, we tend to behave accordingly, both with ourselves and others. This way, reproaches, unkind words, or hostile gestures find space. However, if you manage to carry out positive actions contrary to your mood, the emotions will change rapidly.

Distracting yourself when you're down is a great idea if the distraction is healthy. So think about walking or exercising, perhaps in the pool, to change your emotions.

Reminding yourself daily, even for a few minutes, of your qualities and virtues helps strengthen self-esteem and the ability to respond to negative emotions much more effectively.

Dedicating some time each day to a new activity, such as playing the guitar or learning a new language, helps improve self-esteem and well-being. Following one's daily progress strengthens these feelings.

This reservoir of positive thoughts and emotions will be essential when dealing with negative emotions.