Emotional Management

Feelings are just visitors. Let them come and go.

Emotional management is about being aware of your emotions and being able to manage them effectively. This will help you control your behavior on a day to day basis and also assist you in successfully navigating relationships and stressful times.

Emotional management starts with your ability to accurately perceive, label, and make sense of your emotions. This includes both pleasant emotions and ones that you feel that are uncomfortable or "negative". Examples of self-awareness strategies include:

  • engaging in self-reflection
  • keeping a journal
  • increasing your feelings vocabulary
  • stop treating your feelings as good or bad
  • getting comfortable being uncomfortable
  • getting to know yourself under stress
Once you are aware of and understand your emotions, you want to take action to manage them for best results. This means staying flexible and managing your emotional reactions to situations and people.

Self-management strategies include acceptance and letting go, taking control of your self-talk and visualizing yourself succeeding. You can also try speaking to someone who is not emotionally invested in your problem, finding time for a mental recharge in your schedule and creating better sleep habits. 

 

Ask Yourself:

  • How am I feeling?
  • What can I do with these emotions?
  • How might those around me be feeling emotionally?
  • What is my plan for managing pleasant and unpleasant emotions?

 

Resources

Counseling Services --Need help building a strategy for managing your emotions? Talk with one of our mental health practitioners about personal growth and development.

Health Promotion -- Interested in building emotional health skills in activities led by your peers? Check out the events hosted by the WSU Health Promotion team.

Manitou Center - Explore mindful movement and mind-body connections to help manage emotions.
Bene Brown on Blame - Are you a blamer? Do you have the tenacity and grit to hold yourself accountable? This video shows how exploring your reactions and tendencies may help you understand why you're feeling what you're feeling.

Naturespace - Naturespace is an app that helps with relaxation. 

Emotional Vocabulary List (PDF) - Use this list to expand your feelings vocabulary and give names to your emotions.
Grounding Worksheet (PDF) - Learn how grounding techniques can help you gain control over your feelings so you can address the problem calmly and with a clear head.

Managing Emotions Worksheet (PDF) - This exercise to helps you recognize and gain control of your thinking and your emotions in any situation.

Mindfulness Worksheet (PDF) - Mindfulness is a state of mind in which you are fully present in the moment. Practicing mindfulness increases clarity and focus, which can help you gain perspective and process stressful situations effectively.

Take Control of Test Anxiety Worksheet (PDF) - If you have text anxiety, you know that studying alone isn’t enough. This worksheet helps you develop a strategy to manage text anxiety.

Understanding Your Anxiety Worksheet (PDF) - Even though everyone gets anxious sometimes, anxiety is shown and triggered in different ways for each person. Use this worksheet to understand what makes you anxious and create a plan for dealing with your anxiety.