George Allen Miller One Geek's take on all things SciFi

Long ago, while talking with a psychologist, I came to the realization that most people act in a certain way most of the time. People tend to approach situations with a preset mindset. Some people approach most situations aggressively, honestly, angrily or happily. Others may approach it with some other mindset at work. I began thinking why this was and it occurred to me, people are acting that way because one or two emotions are their primary emotions. For some people, they are locked into an emotional mindset at any given time.

We all have emotions. We all have all emotions in fact. Everyone gets happy, sad, angry and depressed. It’s part of being human. What is also true is that most people are generally happy, sad, angry or depressed. When approached with new situations, people will handle this situations generally with a similar mind set. If a person that is mostly happy most of the time, they will more times than not, be happy. It sounds simple doesn’t it? People that are angry most of the time are angry most of the time. The bigger questions is why? Because they, we, are wired, currently, to be so.

How we are built

What are emotions anyway? They are just chemicals. Complex combinations of chemicals flying around our brains. When we stub our toe an impulse is sent to our brains telling us that something has happened, something drastic. A sudden sharp pain has occurred somewhere. Our brains instantly activate the fight or flight paradigm. With our stubbed toe, we instantly get a feeling of anger and frustration. Sometimes we kick the chair over or throw the kid’s toys to the side of the room. Our brains have very quickly identified the situation as harmless and begin to shut things down. But, the release of chemicals has already occurred, and the anger we have may linger.

Now, imagine if our brains are wired in such a way to release that chemical more than the average person. What happens? We’re angry a lot. We approach most situations with that primary emotion of anger. We drive to work and yell at people. We get into fights with family and friends. When our team loses the game, we throw things.

Anger isn’t the only emotion at work either. This runs the whole gambit. Love, hate, sadness, happiness, and everything in between. I’m sure you have heard the expressing “they wear their heart’s on a sleeve”. But, as with all things dealing with people, no one answer is ever the only answer. We are just too complex for that.

Factors that play in

There are many factors that play into this. I am not saying that someone that is principally angry will never show some other emotion, it’s just not likely. Someone that is happy all the time does get angry. But, if you notice, they do so to a lesser degree. Someone that is angry all the time, does get sad. But it too is to a muted degree.

Life changes can influence our emotions as well. If you are a generally happy person, but you are placed in a high stress and highly confrontational job, you’re principal emotion may begin to change. We will modified ourselves to fit our surroundings. It’s a survival technique. Even though you were always happen at 20, you may be always angry at 40. The point here is what the principle emotion is at this given moment in your life. It won’t change day to day but may over a longer period.

Identifying your Primary Emotion

How can you tell what your emotion is? It’s very hard for people to see things about themselves. I’ve found that doing an objective exercise can help tremendously. Close your eyes and imagine you are some other person. Maybe someone you are a fan of, maybe a total stranger. Now, imagine this new person runs into you at the store, at work, on the street. Make it a real event, meaning a time that actually happened to you. Take a look at yourself, how are you acting? Do this many times for many past experiences you have. Are you generally behaving kindly, lovingly, angrily? If so, that’s it. You’ve just found your primary. This shouldn’t be very difficult to identity, the difficult part comes later.

And if you happen to see yourself acting in a combination of ways, that’s OK. There are no rules here. You may have one or two or three emotions that are at work. Each tugging a little to be the primary that you fall back to.

Identifying in others

What may help you identifying this in yourself is doing so in someone else. Take a look at your co-workers, friends, family. Are some generally happy, comical, sad, angry? Once you begin looking you begin seeing. Once you can see it in someone else, you can begin to see what yours is in you.

Changing the program

OK, so, you’ve figured out that you are generally behaving as if you were happy. Great! Happiness is the one of the better emotions to be your primary. What if you are generally angry? Sad? Are you locked into this forever? Not at all! The first step to any change in ourselves is identifying how we are now. You can’t very well change yourself if you dont’ know what you are changing yourself from. Most people focus on where they are going but don’t have a solid idea of where they are now. How can you know where to go if you don’t know where the starting line is?

Changing, though normally very hard, can be very easy if you do it in small manageable chunks. Don’t expect to wake up tomorrow and be happy all the time. Do try to wake up tomorrow and approach situations from the perspective of being happy. I don’t mean to fake happiness, I mean, imagine a time in your life when you were happy, and choose to feel that way now. Find something small in your day. Your kid’s smile, your dog’s wagging tail, your favorite TV show, a good meal, a pint at the pub, anything. If you want to strive to be more positive, make that your primary focus.

You know what all the emotions feel like, most people have experienced all of them. Pick one you like, and say to yourself, today I will be happy. Smile all day long, do the things that you did when you were feeling that emotion last time. Reward your behavior with positivity. If you find yourself slipping back into some other mindset, wake yourself up and say NO. We discipline or pets, kids, admonish our friends and family, why not ourselves?

Bottom line, we all have one way we generally behave. But it is not set in stone. Find your mindset, choose if you like it and if not, find a new one. It can be very easy simply because whatever you choose, happy, glad or even aggressive, you’ve probably already felt it at one point in your life and know how to feel it again. Now you just have to make a conscious effort to do so. Good Luck!