Self-reflection invites self-awareness, and self-awareness enables you to better regulate your emotions.
From this, we can get a deeper understanding of why we feel the way we feel and make positive steps towards change and growth.
Better emotional regulation equates to less anxiety.
Less anxiety means a more peaceful, contented, and stress-free life.
Psychological research suggests that over 90% of your emotional programming is done by the age of 8 years. This software that runs on autopilot in your subconscious mind, is your emotional blueprint...
The opinion you have of yourself, how you react to other people and external events in life is rooted in your emotional blueprint.
Think of it as a software program or default operating system, installed into your brain at a very young age.
In order for behavioural change to take place, we need to understand this blueprint, and in many cases, install a new one...
Everyone knows the scene...a child throwing a tantrum in the supermarket because it can't have what it wants, probably something sweet, mum or dad say's no, and the child erupts into a tsunami of energy, crying, screaming, throwing themselves about, even hitting out at an exhausted parent...
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Whilst this behaviour isn't acceptable, and part of raising a child is to demonstrate to them this behaviour will not get them what they want, in many cases the parent will conceded defeat, if only to pacify the child whilst they finish the weekly shop.
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It's one thing to pacify a child in this way (although I highly recommend you stand your ground before you make a rod for your own back!), but some of you may have been around adults that behave in the same way?
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There is nothing more tragic than witnessing a fully grown adult, man or woman, throw a hissy fit in order to get what they want, but it happens, I've witnessed it, as I am sure you have too.
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Whilst obvious and not all encompassing, this example gives the illustration of how the emotional blueprint affects someone far beyond their primary years.
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The child that is rewarded for this behaviour is learning not only that it's acceptable, but that also when displayed, it is rewarded and receives what it desired. The blueprint is written, the behaviour receives positive reinforcement, and it's on it's way to becoming a personality trait...not just in the child, but in the adult too, through the inner child in the subconscious mind where it was first planted.
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Child throws a tantrum, gets what it wants, adult throws a tantrum, gets what it wants. It is encoded.
The above example brings the emotional blueprint to life, all be it in an extreme example, and illustrates how you might see it working in someone else.
But in terms of your own self development and moving towards living a more wholehearted life, then exploration of your own emotional blueprint is vitally important to your own wellbeing and inner peace. I am sure you are not the screaming child, it's more likely you keep meeting them, and why you've found yourself here, but you do have one, and for the most part, it's running in the background, I mean, till you read this, did you even know you had one?
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And given you might just be starting to accept that you do, what does it look like? How does your blueprint affect your life and where did it come from?
However, in terms of self development and healing, then the emotional blueprint plays a much more important role than how we react when we can't get what we want or feel entitled to (you're not...).
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It is where the roots lie of your self esteem, your sense of self worth, whether you feel worthy of love - and what love looks and feels like, it is where your identity (ego) starts to take shape and continues to develop from, your sense of right and wrong, your moral compass and value system and it is the place where we find the solution to all the maladaptive behaviours that are playing out in your adult life.
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To change our behaviours in order to experience something different, we must explore our emotional blueprint. This means creating a mental space where we can feel safe doing this exploration. For some this may feel a little scary, because in order to understand our blueprint, we need to go back to childhood, and engage with our inner child.
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This is the starting point for rewiring, for installing new software and for creating a stronger and more resilient blueprint, which drives new conscious and adaptive behaviours rather than unconscious maladaptive coping mechanisms running on autopilot.
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If you want to change the outside, you have to rewire the inside...
