What do you REALLY have control of?

So many of us I am sure can relate to this at some level in points of our lives, or you may be experiencing this now in your life. 

I once used to suffer from a terrible need to control my environment and everyone in it in order for me to feel safe and comfortable.

Many of you may know this intimately or you have someone close to you that is like this.

The house needs to be spotless, things need to be done in a certain way or everything about you is micro managed.

I have experienced both being this person and being on the receiving end of said persons.

I don’t know how many nights I came home from work and would rant and rave because the house was not clean enough.

I will admit that I ranted and raved at my kids when really I was angry that my then husband, who had been at home all day and had done nothing.

So instead of saying anything to him about this, I would rant and rave in the general direction of who ever was in ear shot. 

It was on one such occasion that all of the wind went out of my sails as I almost had an out of body experience and saw and heard myself in that moment and witnessed the impact I was having on the ones I loved the most, my kids.

In that moment I realised that not only was I negatively impacting myself both physically and energetically, I was also having the same impact on my kids.

I have also experienced working in an environment where everything was controlled and micro managed.  Again this had a negative impact on my physical, emotional and energetic wellbeing.

In all of these instances there was a constant underlying thread. I was either trying to control everything outside of myself, or was being controlled by people and situations again outside of myself.

The last 6 years of meditating daily has taught me many things about myself and the world around me.

One of the most freeing however has been the realisation that there are only two things in this life that I have any control over.

How I feel, and how I respond, in any given moment.

Now I known that many of you may instantly think that you don’t have control over how you feel and I beg to lovingly differ. 

Whenever you have an emotional response to something or someone we often blame that person or situation for making us feel a certain way. I would like to break it down to you like this.

No one can emotionally make you feel anything. What actually occurs is that you have a visceral response in your body, hormones are then released into your blood stream.

From this you then attach a thought to that response eg: 
I have a tightening in my body –
Thought = that is because ***** said this or did this thing.

Then you attach the thought to the emotion and potentially continue to add more thoughts to create a structure or a story around that initial response coming up with the conclusion that this person or situation made you feel a this way.

As confronting as this may feel or sound to you it really is only our thoughts about a situation that makes us feel a particular way.

So how can you take back your own power and control in these situations?

First stop and take and breath Ask yourself “What are the thoughts that I am thinking right now” 9 times out of 10 those thoughts will be negative either about you or the other person.

Replace those thoughts with these suggestions:
I am enough 
I am safe and loved
Everyone is doing the very best that they can with the resources they have
This is not about me and everything to do with how this person is feeling internally right now
I am worthy 
I am doing the best that I can right now
I am ok 

This form of instant rethinking puts an immediate stop to the train that you were about to hop onto and allows you to control how you respond in this situation and how you feel internally. 

This is a technique and a strategy that I have been using the last five years and it has been instrumental in placing me back into being at cause in my life rather than being at the effect of everything and everyone outside of myself.

I have no control over anyone else, how they feel, what they say or even what action they take.

What I can control is how I feel, how I respond and what action I choose to take in my life.

I have given so much of my power over to other people and situations in my life and I no longer chose to do.

Blessings 
Kerryn
xxx