Exercise 1 "The Wishlist"

I found a book titled Writing for Emotional Balance by Beth Jacobs, PH.D. over the weekend at Barnes and Noble while my husband and I were on our "date night" without our two year old (my mom took her to see a Jackie Chan movie). It caught my attention mainly because I am tired of constantly being mad at my husband. I noticed there are 8 chapters in this book and in good faith while I focus on a chapter each week... I will be more appreciative of him in 8 weeks! Dream on, Hubby.

After reading about 10 pages of this book, I already feel validated that emotions or feelings (this can be used interchangeably) are doing their job to protect us, inform our decision making, connect us with other people, and give us richness and texture when well regulated. I suppose I'm okay feeling some resentment and anger every now and then. It is when emotions are dysregulated... that is when I start to fly off the handle.

The following first exercise focus on several emotional management skills known as my personal wish list. "Emotionally, I wish I was capable of..."

1. Keeping my sense of humor
2. Not getting so worked up (i.e. hitting the wall and slamming the cabinets in the kitchen even though it feels so good, cursing and name calling which usually makes me feel like crap)
3. Letting go of bad feelings from my past (this is the most challenging of all... I finally forgave my mom for something she did 15 years ago)
4. Not always reacting to my "husband's behavior, thoughts, and/or comments" (this is "fill in the blank")
   
5. Calming myself down
6. Stopping my thoughts from becoming repetitive and destructive when I'm upset (does Beth know me?)
7. Holding onto progress I make emotionally

Just an FYI to my dear readers, the list does not end here but 7 goals in 8 weeks seem more than I can handle right now. Let's proceed...