Behavior! One of the most Challenging aspects for us to control is our behavior. Why?! Because we have our own triggers, we may not know that they are actually triggers until we become self-aware. We have deep rooted issues we may not have resolved and so many other reasons that contribute to why behavior can be difficult to get in control.
Knowing some steps to help you get in control of your behavior to your liking will make it easier to reach your desired goal. At the end of the day, don’t we want to be content with our reactions to our situations among many other things?! Well to have better control over your behavior is to start with self-monitoring yourself.
Follow Along With Me!
If you have been struggling with your emotions that lead to disappointing behaviors, well YOU can change that.
Becoming conscientious of our emotions and triggers can allow us to CHOOSE how WE want to respond to that emotion.
Therefore, becoming aware of our behaviors and identifying what behaviors are working versus not working out for us when we have an emotion can allow us to change our reaction to improve our behaviors.
So as I said before, becoming aware of our behaviors can allow us to choose to change our chosen behaviors. In order to do this, we have to self-monitor ourselves and Self-Monitoring leads to Self-control.
Now, ****I am going to go over how you can change your behaviors simply by self-monitoring yourself.
MEDITATE
Lets begin with good Ol’ meditation. This is number 1 and this is because meditation leads to awareness. Without awareness, we are unable to monitor ourselves because we are unaware! I know I said meditate, and I am sure we are thinking of the example in the picture below or maybe you have a vision of laying down, but really this can be done in any form you find best. Such as, focusing on deep breaths, prayer or even mindful eating. Anything that will make your brain to practice focusing.
LIST YOUR BEHAVIORS YOU WANT TO KEEP TRACK OF
So first we want to see what behaviors are we doing most often and that is because we do not want to overwhelm ourselves with changing all of our negative behaviors at once, instead lets start with the ones we are doing MOST often. So making a list with all of the negative behaviors that occur is to be done – don’t worry about what emotion because more than likely, our negative behaviors occur when its an emotion we are not fond of.
TRACK EACH BEHAVIOR DAILY
For a month, track each behavior daily and log what made that behavior occur that day. So a way you can do this is by setting up a chart and on one side you’ll have the behaviors listed and on the top you’ll have the days of the week and then under each day for each behavior you can type in or write down if that behavior occurred, if so what triggered the emotion that led to the behavior; If that behavior did occur then rate it on a scale of 1-10 or 1-5 with 1 being very intense and 5 or 10 as being not so intense. Some factors that can determine the intensity can be the duration and actions that occurred.
REVIEW YOUR BEHAVIORS
At the end of the month – preferably before the new month, you will want to go back and review your behaviors and identify which behaviors occurred the most and out of the ones that occurred the most, which one was more intense. From here, you’ll probably have one or maybe even more than one that will be prioritized due to the duration and intensity of the behavior and this is the behavior or behaviors you’ll focus on for the next month. If you have more than one behavior that has shown to happen very often with intensity, then make sure to only go for the first 2 or 3 so we don’t overwhelm ourselves.
NEXT…..
We will look at the behaviors that we are going to target for the next month and we will write down what are some triggers that are causing this certain behavior.
Then Note Down:
When this trigger occurs what are some things I can do to overcome the emotion that comes with being triggered. This is also known as replacement behavior – so Replacing your negative behaviors with more acceptable behaviors.
NOW FOR A MONTH….
We will only watch out for the behaviors we have listed and track them each day while also noting down if we used a replacement behavior or coping skill to overcome the trigger.
The goal here is that by the end of the month, we want to see that behavior has decreased. It may not have significantly decreased but over time as you continue to track and become more conscientious about using a replacement behavior, the undesirable behavior will decrease.
We are human we will slip and we will not be perfect, but we want to feel in control of our emotions and reactions instead of allowing our emotions to control us.
Each day you track, you will be reflecting and rating your behavior; you’ll make a goal and maybe even say “okay wow today wasn’t so great with this so tomorrow maybe I can do more of x and y.”
AT THE END OF EACH MONTH….
Reflect over your month and asses what behaviors may need more focus on and reassess whether your coping skills or replacement behaviors are working for you and change them if you need. However, focus on the same behaviors until they have reached what you deem appropriate and acceptable and move on to the next behaviors.
LINK:
Mindful Meditation:
