00:00 

Hey there, this is Intentional Living with Tanya Hale and this is episode number 69, "Internal Control." Welcome to your place for finding greater happiness through intentional growth, because we don't just fall into the life of our dreams...we choose to create it. This is Tanya Hale and I'm your host for Intentional Living. 

00:21 

Alright, happy day to you, I hope you're having a great one. And I've had a terrific day. I had a bunch of my nieces over last night and we just sat around and chatted and had a great time, and this morning we had a good breakfast and so fun. I love my nieces, they are just terrific. 

00:43 

Alright, so we are going to continue on today. We're talking about number five on Brooke Castillo's 10 Things We Need for Good Mental Health and the topic today is Internal Control. So what do we mean when we talk about internal control? Well, let's look at the opposite first, external control. External control would mean that we are allowing things outside of us to control us, things like the weather, our new car, our broken car, our paycheck, what someone else says, somebody else's mood, what kind of house we live in, our weight, our job, our ex-spouse, our mother or our mother-in-law. The list of outside influences is unending and it gets so easy to believe that all of these things really do control us. 

01:33 

When I have a parent at school get upset with me and attack me in a way that I feel is unjustified, it can be difficult not to see that person as the reason I'm in a bad mood for the rest of the day. I mean, really? What right do they have to say those kinds of things to me? When I am busting my butt to help their child, everyone understands why I would be upset by that, right? It seems to make so much sense that this parent is the cause of all of my bad feelings, but in reality they have nothing to do with my feelings. All they did was say some words to me. It was my thoughts about their words that created my feelings. They're adults. They have the right to behave the way they want to behave and to say what they want to say, but it is my responsibility to take control of my thoughts, my feelings, and my behaviors. As soon as I blame them for how I'm feeling, I am giving them control over my life. And do I really want a person who would attack me to be in charge of my feelings? 

02:39 

The sooner that we can learn that external situations really have no control over us, but that we have 100% control over how we feel, the more control we will have over our lives. Now this is a place that many of us have not been taught to live. We have been taught from the time we were little that other people have control over how we feel. We are taught that other people hurt our feelings and that we're responsible for how other people feel. For example, we're asked, "did so-and-so hurt your feelings?" And we're also told, "you hurt my feelings." And really, neither of those statements is true, but we have heard them so many times in our lives that so many of us grew up thinking them to be true. 

03:25 

And so now that I'm teaching you that they're false, I have no doubt that many of you are really resisting what I'm saying right now. You're thinking, "but what about my husband when he told me I've gained a lot of weight this last year?" So what about it? He's an adult. He is entitled to have an opinion and he's entitled to say what he wants. Was it kind? Probably not. But it's his choice to be kind or to be unkind. And guess what? You're not responsible for his behavior in any way, but neither are you responsible for whether or not he chooses to be kind. And you have no control over what he chooses to think or feel or do. 

04:08 

What you do have control over is yourself. Because guess what? You're an adult too. And you are entitled to think whatever you want to think about what your husband says. You have the right, and even the responsibility, to manage your own  thoughts about every situation that happens around you, including if your husband tells you you've gained a lot of weight. In this situation, your husband is an external situation. A person with good mental health realizes and practices the truth that external situations are out of their control. And if it's out of their control, they can fight and resist and complain all they want. And it's not going to do anything but create misery in some form or another in their lives. 

04:57 

As Byron Katie says, "when we fight against reality we are going to lose, but only 100% of the time." That's one of my favorite quotes because we fight against reality so much and it does us no good. We expend all of this energy fighting against something that we can't change. Whenever we allow an external situation to control our feelings, we are becoming a victim of blame. We are giving up our power and our control over ourselves and this is not mentally healthy. Mental health means that we choose to have internal control. We choose to manage our thoughts around any situation and give up the control of how other people behave. 

05:46 

So how do we do this? Well, we've already started with what we've talked about today. The first step is awareness. Awareness of the concept that I'm responsible for how I feel. No one else and nothing else is responsible for my feelings. This is where my training on the thought model starts to take a front stage. So for those of you for whom this is a new concept, I'll do a quick review. The first line of the thought model is our C line, which stands for our circumstance line. We don't have control over our circumstances. In the circumstances we just talked about, a husband saying that you've gained weight, you have no control over that. Zero, nada, zilch, right? Circumstances are facts. Everyone in the world is going to agree on them. You could prove them in a court of law. So my husband said, "you've gained a lot of weight this last year," would be a fact. If you had a recorder and could play it back, then it would be a fact. 

06:48 

So let's say that you did and that was exactly what he said. That's a circumstance, right? The next line in our thought model is the T line, or the thought line. This is our thought about the circumstance. For example, I could think, "he is always so mean to me," or "he regrets that he married me," or "if he really loved me, he would never say that." These are all things that we could think, all things we choose to think. But we could also choose to think, you know, "he's right, I have." Or what about, "I love that he's concerned about my health." The point being here is that we can choose to think whatever we want to think about any circumstance. 

07:33 

Alright, after the thought line, the next line is the feeling line, the F line, okay? Because our thoughts create our feelings. Everything we feel is caused by a thought. Everything. Now, for those of you who are fighting this concept, think about the last time you cried in a movie. You weren't experiencing the hurt, but your thoughts about the characters and what they were going through were creating these feelings that made you cry. I can be just fine, feeling happy, whatever. And then someone can ask me about my mom, who died over 13 years ago. And when I start thinking about her, I will miss her so much that within seconds, I can start to cry when I'm telling them about her. My thoughts about my mom are what are causing me to feel sadness about her not being here with me. Really and truly, our thoughts create every emotion we feel. 

08:33 

Here's another example. One time with a friend, we went into a store and the associate was a little bit rude with us. And as I tend to do, I just kind of blew it off. But my friend just kept thinking about how horrible this person was. So my feelings over the next hour were neutral. And I wasn't thinking about it a lot. I had just kind of blown it off. But hers, she just kept thinking. Thinking about this woman and how mean she was and how horrible she was and her feelings became heightened into anger because of what she was thinking about this person. So, we had had the exact same experience, but because we had different thoughts about it, our feelings were completely different. 

09:15 

Okay, so then the fourth line of the thought model is the A line, or the action line. So all of our actions are caused by our feelings. When we engage in any action, it is because of a feeling that we've had. If I think my husband is so mean to say that, I will feel angry or defensive. If I feel angry, then I might respond with the action of saying something mean back or by raising my voice or by crying or by walking out of the room. Our thoughts create our feelings which create our actions which ultimately create the results we see in our lives. The results line is the last one in the model. Okay, if I continue to think thoughts that make me feel angry toward my husband, then I will be acting in angry ways toward him. The end result of that is not a harmonious relationship, right? 

10:16 

Okay, so this is how having internal control helps us to have better mental health. When I stop blaming outside people and situations for my feelings, and rather begin to embrace the idea that from inside of me I can choose my thoughts, my feelings, and my actions, then I am no longer at the mercy of external situations over which I have no control. I take back full control over me. And this is empowering, and feeling empowered to solve our problems and to move into a place we desire is a huge component of mental health. When we feel out of control, we can really struggle to feel the centeredness in our lives or the concept that many people refer to as balance. When we feel out of control, we can find it difficult to have hope in our future because we feel our future is at the mercy of someone or something else. 

11:15 

But when we take back the control and place it within ourselves, within our ability to manage our thoughts, our feelings and our actions, then we can have hope for the future because we realize that it is in our hands. We control it. We determine where we will be going and what we will be doing. We determine every day how we're going to feel and how we're going to act and what ultimate results we want in our lives. 

11:42 

Another piece of this that I want you to be aware of is that if we approach any circumstance from the A line or the action line, we are coming at it from an external angle. Our actions are external behaviors rather than internal behaviors. Let me give you an example. If someone is wanting to have a better relationship with their estranged mother, they may decide that they will call her every Sunday afternoon from now on. Now that's a lovely sentiment, isn't it? It sounds so nice. I'm going to call my mom every Sunday. But the problem occurs when we find ourselves during the whole call thinking negative things about everything she says, and we get off the call angry and frustrated with the experience. We're questioning her motives. We're second-guessing things she's saying. We are thinking about how much we would rather be doing something else. So we're changing this action by calling her, but we're not addressing the root of the problem, which is our thoughts about our mother that caused us to be estranged from her in the first place. 

12:45 

In my coaching, we call this working from the A-line. We're working to change the action without first recognizing the thought that creates the feeling that then creates the action. Sometimes this is also referred to as causal coaching. We're working to find the internal cause of the problem in order to solve it, rather than just trying to solve it through external behaviors, which never work long term. The real solution to having a better relationship with your mother is to manage your thoughts about her. So seeking internal control through managing our thoughts, we can change our feelings toward our mother, and then our actions will naturally follow. We will begin calling because we have kinder, gentler feelings toward her, and that comes from the thoughts that are forgiving and giving her the benefit of the doubt. 

13:40 

Another example could be someone who wants to lose weight. So much of the health industry is trying to change the unhealthiness by attacking our actions, what we're putting into our mouths, and our behaviors. They tell us specifically what foods to eat and when, how much to exercise, how much water to drink. Now many of these diets are teaching some great stuff, but by working from the A line or the action line, the change will not be lasting because the thoughts that create those actions are going to stay the same. And this is why so many people will lose weight only to gain it back again because once they stop the actions, the thoughts that created the unhealthy weight in the first place take over and start creating exactly what it created before. 

14:28 

So if instead we investigate the cause of the unhealthy weight, our thoughts about food and about eating, then we will begin to change our feelings about food. And then our actions have lasting purpose and meaning. Implementing internal control before external control is a long lasting solution. Working to manage our lives from the inside out not only helps to instill lasting, meaningful change, but it gives us a sense of control over our lives that helps us to feel hope and positivity toward our future. And when we feel hope and positivity, our actions move us in the direction we really want to go. 

15:13 

So our mental health really is impacted in a huge way by looking inside for the answer to any problem we will encounter in our lives. And when we feel capable of handling and working through any problem we encounter, it changes everything we do and how we engage with everyone around us. This is when we start truly taking responsibility for our lives, for every  aspect of our lives. We step into emotional adulthood realizing that only I am responsible for my emotions and my actions. So one else. So remember the definition of mental health we've talked about these last few podcasts. It says that mental health "refers to our cognitive, behavioral, and emotional well-being. It is all about how we think, feel, and behave. Mental health can affect daily life, relationships, and even physical health. Mental health also includes a person's ability to enjoy life, to attain a balance between life's activities and efforts to achieve psychological resilience." 

16:24 

Internal control is a big piece in this puzzle of mental health. It definitely helps us to attain resilience when we encounter difficult circumstances because it places us in the driver's seat where we maintain control over how we think, over how we feel, and over how we behave. 

16:44 

Okay, I love growing up, don't you? Love, love putting these pieces together. Alright, if you would like some personal help with me in working this thought model, in figuring out how it works in your life and how to attack the thought rather than just the actions, you can contact me at tanyahale.com. You can go into "contact me" and you can send me an email and I will get back with you. And we can have a complimentary session to get you started. I would love to help you learn how to have more internal control by controlling your thoughts. 

17:24 

Alright, hey, if you haven't subscribed, go ahead and do so. Leave me a review. I would like to get up to 100 reviews. And if you will please share this with someone who you feel could benefit from this amazing information, go ahead and share it and let's get some more people on board here. Okay, hope you have a really, really terrific day and I will talk to you next time. Thank you so much for joining me today. If you would love to receive some weekend motivation, be sure to sign up for my free "weekend win" Friday email: a short and quick message to help you have a better weekend and position yourself for a more productive week. Go to tanyahale.com to sign up and learn more about life coaching and how it can help you get to your best self ever. See ya!