With 5 Tips To Gain It Back
If you have never felt the feeling of losing control in your life, consider yourself lucky.
Understandably as women, we cycle through many different emotions in a day…week…or month and a lot of that has to do with whatever current situation we are facing, whatever past situations we are trying to overcome, our day to day lifestyles, and then managing the task of balancing all of those elements at once.
I would be telling a lie if I said there haven’t been times where I wanted to snap. When I simply wanted to just energetically throw in the towel because I felt as if nothing was making sense in my life. I felt like I didn’t always have complete control over everything and that would often make for a lot of sleepless nights and long slow mornings.
I truly believe that in 2023 alone I asked myself no less than a hundred thousand times, “what the hell is going on with my life right now?”
The feeling of losing control does that though, it brings confusion, it brings mental turmoil, it onsets fatigue and low energy and it brings heightened emotions.
So I want to break down at least 5 different ways the feeling of losing control can impact us and some realistic tips or solutions to help us navigate through them.
Dealing With The Confusion
The Feeling: The confusion sets in when you begin to think deeply about where you are in your life and feel as though you can’t seem to understand how you’ve gotten to such an overwhelming feeling of stress, which could come from not being balanced in terms of the amount of stress you are carrying vs the amount of stress relief you are implementing. Like, you…the person that always has to hold it together and just handle it, the person that always has a plan, you have somehow managed to lose the flow of that juggle you were keeping up, and somehow everything just… dropped.
The Solution: Start by being mindful of your thoughts during this time. Mindset is everything. And no this is not just a cliche idea, you really are what you think you are. In your feelings of being overwhelmed and confused, dedicate yourself to a very intentional time each day, (preferably first thing each morning when you wake up and each night before you go to bed) and set your mindset just like you set your alarms. “Start and Set” your mindset to process and understand that even though it feels overwhelming, you are allowed to feel those feelings but your mind doesn’t have to be a prisoner there.
Minimizing Overwhelming Thoughts
The Feeling: The feeling of being overwhelmed sets in when we have reached our mental capacity. We have likely taken on too many thoughts for our brains to process at once and it’s very likely that there may even be thoughts and ideas that we can move a notch or two down in the list of priorities or toggle them over to the list of uncontrollable. This is going to take trust in yourself and trust in the process.
The Solution: Make an actual visual list. In fact make a two sided list. List on one side the things that are out of your power, TBD..simply just uncontrollable by you in this moment. Then make a list of the things that are controllable. This is the list we want to prioritize. On this side of the list we want to focus on the level or urgency or priority and just work from there. And everything on the other side of this list we are going to choose to disconnect those things from having power of our emotions and leave them where they are.
Processing Failed Expectations
The Feeling: This feeling is always tough to process. When you have given so much of your energy pouring into something, that just didn’t turn out the way you expected it to…even after your constant struggle to give it everything you knew how to give. In intimate relationships especially, when you’re left feeling like you gave it your all and the other person gave what feels like minimal effort. You feel like you lost the control of the grip you had holding onto something you wanted so badly. Failed friendships that you’ve put years of your life into…or even in careers, when you’ve lost an opportunity or maybe even lost the job all together. It’s disappointing when you’re being let go due to circumstances that are out of your control, no matter how badly you need the stability.
The Solution:. Here is where you may need to do some reflecting and assessing and go back to your mindset as well to be really honest with yourself. The things that you are being forced to let go of, were there signs that you needed to cut ties? Were they the source of any added stress to your life? Was it difficult to maintain the relationship? Was the friendship one sided and growing to be invaluable? Was the job an environment that you could really see yourself happily working for, for years to come? Or was staying employed more about the money and stability of having a consistent income? There are a plethora of questionable reasons as to why you are now facing cutting ties and sometimes the universe forces us when we don’t take the next actionable step in removing these things from our lives. So after you have done some really honest reflecting, can you somehow manage to gain your control by understanding that the inevitable release of whatever this is was necessary for your growth and it now clears the pathway for what is better to come.
Managing The Madness
The Feeling: Honestly, with all the feelings you are experiencing due to increased stress and life trials it’s no wonder you were on the verge of lashing out on someone. Especially if you are processing things alone, that can sometimes make the feelings far more intensified when you feel you have no one else to depend on. Though anger and frustration are valid emotions, they are bound to surface and sometimes in the wrong direction if you don’t deal with them head on. You can easily find yourself taking that out on people that may not even deserve it, and even if they do, it’s better for you to still be able to control these emotions.
The Solution: Again, you have to deal with these emotions on site. Meaning right at the very moment you experience them, you have to find out what grounding methods you can use that will bring you back down from this emotion. What can you do as an alternative in this moment? Maybe this will consist of you doing something that brings you a fulfilling wave of positive energy and vibes. What is something that is meaningful to you? Perhaps journaling or being creative. Connecting with nature. Something that brings you peace…Something that can change your focus in that moment. If we can learn how to take the control of the emotion back by refocusing or distracting ourselves right then and there, you are less likely to give that rage the energy it needs to feed from.
Alleviating the Anxiety
The Feeling: The worry. The not knowing what your life will look like going forward. Not even knowing what tomorrow will bring, next week. Feeling like coping will be the most difficult thing you will have to be able to do, and honestly sometimes it does feel that way. The worrisome feelings all over the place, the rabbit hole thoughts that take over. You literally feel like you’re losing your mind.
The Solution: Be self aware and be honest enough with the yourself to know when this is something you can manage to work through and cope with on your own, or if this is something that you really may need to consider an outside source to help guide you through. Seeking therapy is probably something most people reading this would have guessed would be one of the “solutions” but that is because it’s something that we need, and that we need to be more comfortable with speaking about and being okay with incorporating into our lives. To be clear, therapy is not always the next necessary step. Sometimes we are fully capable of managing through these feelings and that is a great thing. But should you feel like nothing you are doing on your own to cope through these feelings is working, and you feel like your mental state is just too clouded and overwhelmed, take control back by deciding for yourself that you want and will obtain what’s best for you by any means necessary.
Sometimes the strongest thing you can do for yourself is the hardest but you will thank yourself and love yourself even more when you take back your control.
Until Next Time
Peace & Blessings,
Blog Queen
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