Emotional Intelligence

The most important skill that I have learned is how to not let other's emotions and my own emotions impact me. Even now it is still challenging to remember to use my techniques to not let strong emotions affect me. But my ability is there and more often than not I can manage it.

What's the secret?

For me it goes like this...

1) NOTICE. I can't change anything I don't notice. I notice my own strong negative feeling and how it's affecting me physically. Or I notice that someone close to me is having a strong emotion and how it's making me feel physically. Step 1 glides right into step 2.

2) FEEL it in my body. Does my chest feel tight? Has my breathing sped up? Are my shoulders rising?

3) CHANGE. I slow my breathing intentionally or take a deep breath if my breathing stopped. If the negative emotion is external then typically the person will also take a deep breath automatically. I relax my shoulders and check my posture. 

4) VISUALIZE. If the emotion is particularly strong, it is helpful for me to take a moment for some internal visualization. I picture the emotion as water washing over me, but not through me. Or I'm sitting on a riverbank watching the emotion go by, floating on a leaf. Sometimes I picture my emotion is a stone that I'm holding in my hand. This helps me examine it more closely. Why am I feeling this? What can I do to resolve it?

For example... Something happens to make me feel angry.

1) I notice that I'm feeling angry.

2) I feel the anger as a knot in my stomach and see that my fists are clinched.

3) I actively unclinch my fists and start deep belly breathing.

4) I hold the anger as a fire ball in my mind and examine it. What just happened? If my anger is valid, I imagine I let it go like a dragonfly into the universe. If not I look within to see why what just happened made me feel so angry. Am I instead feeling afraid, vulnerable? Anger is often a shield for other emotions.

I can easily go through life being continuously reactionary. It's not at all hard to do. I'm very empathic and pick up on other's emotions easily. Being able to filter out what warrants a reaction and what is just better to let pass is the most important skill I've learned. It helps me feel calm, centered and saves my energy for much more important things like love.

Bathtub Theory

The energy symptom of my condition can be hard to explain. Most people can understand what "progressive muscle weakness" involves, even though it's invisible. The more I use my muscles, the weaker they get. But energy is more complex to put into words. 

I like strong visuals, they help me to better understand non-visual concepts. There is the very popular "Spoon theory" that some people use to better comprehend the energy struggles of someone with a chronic illness. Though excellent, that theory doesn't quite explain my personal energy struggles correctly. So I came up with my own "Bathtub theory." Here's how it goes.

Overnight when I sleep my "bathtub" (body) is filled with energy (water.) You still with me? Pretty simple. When I wake up, I have a full bathtub. I have good energy and am ready for the day.

Here's where my mitochondrial disease kicks in.

The second I wake up, the drain is pulled and my energy starts to go.

When I do some activities the water pours out faster. For example. If I'm gardening or cleaning my house, it's a gush of water down the drain. I lose a lot of energy doing those things. If I'm a passenger in a car, then it's just normal draining. 

The only thing that stops the drain is sleep. It doesn't fill back up until the next night's rest. When I lay down and take a nap the plug goes back in to stop the water loss but that's it. My muscles may "refresh" but never my energy.

A healthy, able bodied person loses energy too of course. Their tub also starts to drain when they wake up. But here's where we differ. They can easily add more water by eating, having a cup of coffee, sitting down to relax, etc... All of these things will add more water to their tub. Nothing will actually ADD water to mine except for a solid night's sleep.

If I didn't have my medication and supplements I would start each day with maybe a quarter tub fill instead of a full tub. I suffer from chronic pain, but it's not as awful as it would be without my medication. I also sleep more soundly through the night with my drugs to help me. Both of these things take a lot of water if not kept in check.

To recap.

The second I wake up my full tub of energy starts to lose water. The plug is pulled. The water is draining continuously through the day, just at different rates. A nap will stop it draining, but not fill it back up again.

Knowing this about my body I try to weigh what is worth doing and what I can put off or modify so I don't lose as much water.