Central Lutheran Church - Elk River
Central Lutheran Church - Elk River
Mastering Your Emotions {Reflections}
Ever been swept away by your emotions, feeling like you've jumped into a rushing river with no control over where you'll end up? That's exactly what we're diving into today as I share a powerful insight that's been transforming my life at 45 years old.
When someone cuts us off in traffic or rolls their eyes during dinner, we have immediate reactions. These knee-jerk responses can carry us miles downstream before we even realize what's happened. But what if there's a better way? What if, instead of being swept away, we could pause and get curious about what's really happening beneath the surface?
I share two powerful stories that illustrate this principle in action. First, an elderly gentleman from our church who, rather than ignoring difficult spiritual teachings, approached me with genuine curiosity about how to reconcile them with his natural feelings. Then, my 19-year-old son who impressed me by recognizing and journaling about his emotional patterns around failure in lacrosse. Both exemplify the ancient wisdom that "the unexamined life is not worth living."
Drawing from insights in "The Untethered Soul," I explore how we are not our emotions – we're the ones experiencing them. This simple distinction creates space for curiosity and freedom. By metaphorically stepping outside ourselves and observing our reactions with the detachment of an investigative reporter, we build the muscle of responding thoughtfully rather than reacting impulsively.
This journey isn't easy, but it's transformative. When we learn to respond according to our deepest values rather than react from old wounds, we reclaim our power and live more intentionally. Join me in this practice of curiosity – it might just change everything about how you navigate life's challenges.
Share this episode with someone who could benefit from a little more emotional freedom, and remember that curiosity might be the most underrated superpower we have.
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What is up everybody? Hey, my name is Ryan. Welcome to our Reflections Podcast. I'm in studio here with Mike and man. I had this I don't know, I've had this thing come up in my life several times in the last many months. And then I had had this I don't know, I've had this thing come up in my life several times in the last many months. And then I had two stories that I want to share that were kind of in the same vein, but here's what I'm learning about myself. Have you ever noticed? Well, if you haven't, I would encourage you to start noticing this.
Speaker 1:But when things happen to us, we generally tend to have a certain kind of a reaction. I don't mean a response that usually comes later, but a reaction like immediate, you know, like knee-jerk reaction. Whether it's good or bad, healthy or not, I don't know. I'm just saying like. We tend to like have this reaction. Someone cuts you off in traffic Boom, you have this reaction. Someone that you're having dinner with rolls their eyes at you Boom a reaction. It Someone that you're having dinner with rolls their eyes at you Boom a reaction. It also could be a positive one, like, let's say, an attractive person across the room gives you the smile. Whatever you have this reaction, you know. And here's the thing Sometimes that reaction can feel like you just jumped into a river and off you go.
Speaker 1:Like imagine a river that's speeding down the mountain Speeding I don't know if that's really. It's moving fast down a mountain and you just jumped into it and then you're swept away and it's a rush. But here's the problem sometimes there's rocks down there and boulders and you get your arm stuck in a tree and yanks you backwards. It can be painful and you don't know where you're going. And lo and behold, by the time the river calms down, you climb out of it. You're like miles down the river. The river calms down, you climb out of it, you're like miles down the river. So I guess here's what I'm learning in my own life. Like there are many things in my life from the time I was a young boy till now that I've reacted. I will have a thing happen to me and I don't want to go into all the gory details but and I was jumping in the river, man, I'm like woo off we go and I'm enjoying the ride, but I find that it can be really destructive. So what I'm learning as a 45-year-old guy now is like hey, don't do that.
Speaker 1:Is there a way to, instead of just jumping in the river and going down the road or reacting in these ways, is there a way to slow down and look at it from the outside, as it were? And I would say here's the title of this podcast is Be Curious. Is there a way to almost climb out of my of my own body? I can't do this, but, metaphorically, like and like, look at myself and just be curious. Like, hey, ryan, why are you? Why does that bother you? Why did that guy cutting up in traffic? What did that mean? Why did? Why did you react that way? Or why are you feeling this emotion right now? And why are you when that, when that person rolled their eyes, what happened? And like almost like you're a detective and just kind of like what's going on, without attaching yourself to the emotion or the reaction. Does that make sense? So like there's this great line in a book I read called the Untethered Soul it's a really good book actually and he says look, he opens it by saying you are not your emotions.
Speaker 1:There's a school of thought in psychology that suggests this very thing, but it's very liberating you are not your emotions, you're the one simply experiencing the emotion. So imagine you're a person on a mountain and your emotions are clouds that just go by you and there goes another one. There goes, that was an angry I felt. Notice how I felt angry there. Oh, look over there. I noticed how that made me kind of sad. And you don't have to attach yourself where you're, like I'm not, I'm angry and I'm an angry person. Same with your thoughts. Like you know, there are folks that will have thoughts of like um, like murderous thoughts, like they'll have a rage. I'm going to kill that person, like okay, well, that doesn't mean you're a murderer, you just you had the, you were the one that had this thought that was like well, that was like a level 10 kind of thought. And one of the ways to like distance yourself is to just have this curiosity about it and don't jump into the river right away Just like hey, what's going on here? So, okay, here.
Speaker 1:So there's an older gentleman in our church and we had a last week. He pulls me aside, he's got to be in his early 70s and he goes hey, ryan, I just want to know, what do you do? Like? I know that Jesus has to love our neighbor, but I sometimes don't want to, and if I hear a story about somebody that murders somebody, I don't want to love them. And I was like dude.
Speaker 1:So we talked about this and we unpacked it. And we talked about this and we unpacked it and we talked about what does it mean to love somebody? Does it mean just condoning what they did? Does it mean not allowing justice to take place? No, these are different things, right, and what does it mean to really love them in that way? But I said at the end I go, dude, I want to commend you for asking the question. Like most of us don't do that. We don't even think, oh, what Jesus said was pretty radical and it was disturbing, I'm just going to ignore it. No, this guy, he didn't want to ignore it. He said it was hard to do it because a lot of what Jesus says is really really hard. That's given, but many of us don't take it seriously enough, and so, but he was wrestling with it. He was being curious, like, what do I do here?
Speaker 1:Similarly, my son and I don't think he'd mind me sharing this, but my son, he called me this morning and he's going through this stuff with his lacrosse season. He's a great lacrosse player, a smart kid, but he just noticed some of his own behaviors and what happens when he fails and some of his own emotions attached to that and how, when he doesn't perform well on the field, he makes meaning of it in all these ways that are probably not accurate. You know like, oh now, if I don't win this face-off, I'm a failure, my coach won't like me, my dad won't like me, these kinds of things, which is not true, but that's his reaction to it. And I told him I go buddy, just be curious about it, like if you can climb out of it and be curious, and I go. But also, dude, you're 19, I'm so proud of you for at least just asking that. And he wrote this journal page about his own emotions, like, dude, that's awesome.
Speaker 1:And I said you both you guys, this older guy and my young son, like are miles ahead of most of us who don't even stop to think about why we're behaving certain ways or how the the teachings of jesus might confront my own, you know, selfish behaviors. We don't even stop to think, you know, which then reminds me of the great saying I think it was Aristotle or Socrates or Plato. One of those three giants said the unexamined life is not worth living. And many of us just go through life asleep and we don't ask the questions or even take a minute to pause and reflect. And it's like what if we did that? What if we just like?
Speaker 1:Instead of reacting in these ways when my wife or my son or my boss does something to me that causes a reaction to me, because I'm responsible for my response, not them. I am, I'm the one that is responsible. For example, if I punch my boss, I'm the one who goes to jail, not him for giving me more work to do right. So it's my job to control my reactions. And you start by just distancing yourself from it and noticing it and be like, oh, I'm curious about that. And like Braylee, don't get in the river man. Just like, hold on, notice things and just be curious about it. Why did I react that way? Or why do I feel like crying right now? Why does my chest hurt? And notice, I don't have to be these emotions or I don't have to be these thoughts, I'm the one experiencing them and then just be curious about it. So, yeah, that's it.
Speaker 1:My encouragement today is to be throughout your day. Imagine that you're watching yourself from like a video phone or something like this, and you're like an investigative reporter or a psychologist or whatever, and you're just like, why is this person behaving this way? And watch it, and what happens is you'll immediately distance yourself from your own self and you can kind of more level-headedly see what's going on just beneath the surface. And when you do that generally, you can begin to build a muscle of responding better in a different way. Because what we want to do is we want to build a life where I respond and I don't react, where, when things happen, those things don't control me no longer. I respond how I want to and I want to respond according to my values or the teachings of Jesus, rather than my own reactions, which are an eight-year-old kid coming out because he was hurt on the playground. You know what I'm saying. And so we want to be people who respond in mature, steady-level ways that are in accordance to our values, not just reactionary.
Speaker 1:Okay, no, I'm not saying it's easy either. It's super hard. It's super hard, but try it. Let me know how it goes. All right, love you guys, peace. Hey, if you enjoy this show. I'd love to have you share it with some friends. And don't forget, you are always welcome to join us in person at Central in Elk River at 830, which is our liturgical gathering, or at 10 o'clock, our modern gathering. Or you can check us out online at clcelkriverorg Peace.
