Mind Control and Distraction: Mind Control Techniques for a Lifetime

Chapter 3 Control and Regulation of Negative Emotions (2)
Many people decompress themselves by temporarily changing their environment.A friend of mine who is a boss has the habit of disappearing from the office when he feels the pressure is suffocating, go to the square to feed the pigeons or go for a walk in the park, without a mobile phone, and without contact with outsiders , put yourself out of the hustle and bustle of the world.This way of decompression has many benefits, but is it a bit troublesome for you to escape from work suddenly, take the bus across the downtown area to the park, and run all the way?

In fact, we can design a simpler "escape route" - hide in your "decompression chamber".Build this "decompression room" in your imagination and carry it with you. When you are sleepy or irritable, you can visit it quickly, take a break, and your energy will come back.In your mental and emotional "decompression chamber", no matter how stormy or stormy the outside may be, there is still a sea of ​​tranquility inside.

I believe everyone has a place of peace in their hearts.It never moves, remains still, undisturbed.What we have to do is to find this place, walk in it every once in a while, rest in it, and let ourselves recover.Relying on imagination to build a "decompression chamber" in a quiet place of mind, a refuge cabin - this is the best medicine I have ever prescribed to a patient.

If you like poetry, decorate it with the most beautiful sentences; if you like oil painting, decorate it with your favorite landscape.In short, the color in the cabin is your favorite, choose one from comfortable colors such as sky blue, light green, and light yellow.The decor in the house should be simple and rustic, beautiful but not fancy, nothing to distract you.Inside you still have your comfy mattress, comfy chairs, and through the bright windows you can see the beach and the tide, but you can't hear the waves because your cabin is so peaceful.

When building this house in your mind, you must put your heart and soul into it, considering every detail of it as if you were building a real house.Don't give up halfway just because you think it's pediatrics.The point of this decompression method is that you are careful and serious when you create it in your mind, making it more authentic.

Appropriate escapism, give yourself a break every day

Maybe you run around every day, busy.But no matter how busy you are, I hope you set aside a little time every day to take a little errand to your quiet cabin.Whenever you're feeling stressed and overwhelmed, head into the cabin for a break.It's not a waste of time, because work and rest will make you more efficient, and the payoff will be obvious.

After entering the hut, imagine that you walk up the stairs step by step, walk through the corridor, slowly open the door, enter the room, come to the chair you are familiar with, and sit down, very comfortable, relaxed and peaceful.In the imagination, you have to repeatedly think about every detail of the tranquility and comfort here.Your house is very safe and quiet, no one can disturb you.You've left worry at the door, where you don't have to worry or think about anything or make any decisions.

Sometimes escapism is good too.Don't think "escapism" is a negative word.In fact, sleeping is escaping reality, holding an umbrella in the rain is escaping reality, building a hut to shelter from wind and rain is escaping reality, and leaving work to go on vacation is also escaping reality.Our brains and nerves also need to escape from reality from time to time, so that we can move more freely and relax, and avoid the attacks of external stimuli.So, build a hut for your mind to protect it, just as your body needs a room and a bed.Taking a daily vacation of your mind to a quiet cabin is actually allowing yourself to escape for a while from the real world full of responsibilities and obligations, choices and pressures, and leave the distracting things behind.

Let go of the old mindset before tackling the new one

The same goes for the calculator example: A sales manager had a busy day at the company and brought the irritability of work with him when he came home from work.He can become impatient in front of his family.Therefore, he had a big fight with his wife and brought a bad psychological shadow to his daughter.Bringing home negative emotions and thoughts at work will not only do no good to work, but will also make your family life worse.This is how many family conflicts arise.

At this time, go to your stress relief cabin, and it will help you avoid such a bad problem.Between get off work and on the way home from work, use a little time to enter the quiet cabin in your heart to relax for a while, it will play a role of "clearing" similar to a calculator, allowing you to change your mentality and thoughts between multiple tasks and multiple environments be more flexible.

Insomnia and irritability are all emotional residues.Bring the day's worries to bed before bed, and of course you'll be tossing and turning and having trouble falling asleep.When you talk to a new client, you bring the emotions of the last client who made you angry, and it will cause new conflicts.Residual emotions can make it difficult for you to face new situations.So, when things change, go relax in your cabin and clear your mind.

"Papa Papa" helps you decompress
When I was on a TV talk show, I was chatting with the host in the backstage lounge, and the director poked his head in to remind us that there was only one minute left before recording. "Sorry, wait for me for a while", the host said to me.Then, he closed his eyes, raised his hand, snapped, snapped, snapped his fingers a few times, and then sat there motionless.A few seconds later, he opened his eyes and said to me with a smile, "Go, let's record the show".After speaking, he walked through the corridor with his head held high, passed through the curtain, and came to the stage, facing the full audience and the camera lens.

After the recording of the show, I asked him what happened to his strange behavior just now. "That was my preparatory activity," he said. "When I first entered the industry, I had to spend half an hour trying to forget things that had nothing to do with the show and recall the opening remarks before going on stage. Slowly, I was able to get better and better. You are getting more proficient in this step, now half a minute is enough for me."
"Then what are you doing snapping your fingers?" I asked.

"I was thinking of the popping sound as the flipping of a light switch. The first sound is to clear the mind, like turning off the light and you can't see anything; the second and third sound is like turning on the light , open the slideshow, and the slideshow is showing the picture of me hosting the show quickly——I briskly walked onto the stage amidst applause, happily interviewed the guests during the show, and made the audience laugh. Farewell, and I wish the next program recording will be smooth." He added: "Maybe you don't know it yet, but this trick was inspired by your article!"
keep the good mood going

Bad emotions are passed on to each other, and so are love and friendship, peace and quiet.

As mentioned before, people will not get fear, anger, anxiety and other bad emotions when they are completely relaxed, peaceful and quiet.So entering the quiet hut of the soul has become an ideal way to get rid of bad emotions.At the same time, no matter what happens afterwards, the good state of mind and emotion will be passed on and lasted.

I practice experiencing this stillness before and after operating on patients.Surgery requires doctors to be highly concentrated, calm and stable.If negative emotions such as anxiety and depression are brought into the surgical environment, the consequences will certainly be disastrous.Therefore, I need to take a moment to relax in my spiritual cabin for a while.On the other hand, the state of concentration in surgery is not appropriate to bring to social situations.So after last night's surgery, when I left the operating room, I also took a few minutes to go to the cabin to calm down and get ready to deal with something different.

One of my colleagues, San Francisco surgeon Sharp, had a similar experience.But his method is to play movies in the brain.This video in my head describes the entire process of surgery - from the incision to the final suturing.He will create and play the whole movie in his mind the night before the major operation, so that the perfect operation process will remain in his mind for a long time. When he actually stands on the operating table the next day, he only needs to follow the steps of last night. The plot of the movie starts working on it.It seems that we doctors all have our own way of conveying a calm and good mood to the operation.

Protect your spirit

By practicing the techniques in this chapter, you'll learn how to protect your spirit.This umbrella can block the invasion of external stimuli, bringing you more peace and tranquility.As a psychoactive drug, the umbrella has no side effects and doesn't have to cost money to buy.

Don't forget what I said before: Whether you are restless or calm, panic or calm, the key lies in your response to external stimuli, not the stimulus itself.If you don't respond to external stimuli, no matter what happens, you won't be in a bad mood.

Be a doer, not a responder.Human responses must be coordinated with environmental factors.But fundamentally, people are not responders, but doers.We are not just a small boat drifting with the tide, but a helmsman looking for the goal and heading towards the goal.After determining the goal, we can make an appropriate response to the environment, and this response is our own initiative.

If a reaction to a negative affect does not keep us moving in the direction of our goal, or negatively impacts the achievement of our goal, then there is no need to react at all; that is, if the reaction takes us off course, then These responses are inappropriate responses.

Find a mood stabilizer
In the process of pursuing the goal, the so-called emotional stabilizer is to keep the goal unchanged.The negative influence of external stimuli will always make you deviate from the course, so we must avoid adverse reactions and keep the ship stable.Our ships cannot be bumped, swayed, run aground or even sink due to waves or even storms.

[-]. Do not fight imaginary enemies

Another reaction that can cause mental anxiety, nervousness, and restlessness is the emotional subjective imagining of things that don't exist.Many people overreact to real stimuli in real-world situations, and don't stop there, making things up in their heads and reacting to them.There are already many negative factors in the environment, and it is very wrong for us to add negative factors ourselves.For example, someone will think about "what if that happens" and the like.In fact, the human nervous system cannot distinguish whether the stimulus is real from the outside world or fabricated by one's own imagination, so it will cause adverse reactions and produce bad emotions.

[-]. "Doing nothing" is the solution strategy to deal with virtual problems
You are completely in control of your emotions from this fabricated distraction.The method is not to do something, but to do nothing, that is, to refuse to react.When you want to react to a worrying situation, quickly stop yourself and ignore it.Emotionally, as long as you live in the present moment, you are fine.We have to analyze what exists and what does not exist in the environment in order to make a correct response.This can be done by staying alert at all times and focusing on what is going on, not on the illusory surroundings.

[-]. Emotional First Aid Kit

You can shape the following thoughts and keep them in your mind as a "first aid kit": Almost all inner agitation is caused by overreaction and oversensitivity, build a barrier between yourself and the stimulus, and just don't react.

You can correct the habit of overreacting and eliminate past conditioning by doing the practice of delaying the response.Change old habits and form new good ones.

Relaxation is a natural calming medicine.To relax is to not react.As long as you learn how to relax your body through daily training, and master how to use it skillfully, you will relax at critical moments and will not respond to bad stimuli.

Just in time to get into the mind cabin.The peace of mind cabin acts both as a tranquilizer to soothe your nervous responses and as an eraser to erase residual emotions from the mind that do not apply to the new situation.

Your unreal mental images can bring you bad emotions.Stop fighting imaginary enemies and just react emotionally to what is/now and leave the rest alone.

(End of this chapter)