Skill #5:  Why Developing an internal Locus of Control                                                 is so important

People often talk about their feelings, and where they come from in semantically imprecise or incorrect ways.  Doing so often causes them to feel worse than they need to, for longer than they need to, and to miss many opportunities to feel better.  We are often quick to correct young people when they speak or write in semantically and grammatically incorrect ways about other things, but rarely do so when they do the same with their feelings.    There are more semantically precise and correct ways to talk that remind us of the power we really do have over our emotional destiny.  For example:              It's my choice how I look at things                                                                   It's my choice what meaning I attach to what happens                              It's my choice what I focus on                                                                           It's my choice what I compare things to                                                          It's my choice what I expect of myself, others and life                                It's my choice what I imagine will happen next                                             It's my choice how much importance I attach to what happens              It's my choice how I want to feel                                                                       No one upsets me, I upset myself                                                                     I'm disturbing myself about that                                                                        Whatever someone else says or does is just an event                               My thoughts cause my feelings, not events                                                   I'm responsible for how I feel, not others                                                        It's not their problem if I feel bad, it's mine                                                     It's not their job to make me feel better, it's mine

It's also important to not take unnecessary responsibility for how others make themselves feel.
However they feel will be perfectly understandable, even if they generate more emotion than is
necessary or helpful.  It's part of being human.  However, like us, they have a host of cognitive
choices to make, that they alone can make, that determine how they end up feeling, and the
frequency, intensity and duration of any emotions they generate.  We can't control how they
make those choices any more than they can control how we do.  They could disturb them-
selves a great deal over what most people would consider nothing, or they could choose to
look at things in a way that causes them to not get upset about something most others would.  
We're responsible for what we say and do, but not how they choose to look at it, what they
choose to think it means, what they choose to focus on or compare things to, and so on.  The
way they do is understandable, but it's ultimately their choice and they, like us, will have to
suffer any emotional consequence there might be from making their cognitive choices that way.

You simply need to change the pronouns in the statements above to create statements that
will help you avoid taking unnecessary responsibility for how others make themselves fee.  For
example, "It's THEIR choice how THEY look at things" or "No one upsets THEM, THEY upset
THEMSELVES".

Locus of Control means where people see their feelings as coming from, what they see as the
cause of them.  Most people have an external locus of control.  They wrongly believe that what
others say and do, and what happens, makes them feel the way they do.  This makes how they
feel depend on events and people they can't control.  It makes feeling better dependent on
those events and people changing for the better, and they may not. This causes them to feel
worse than necessary, for longer than they need to.  It can also cause them to feel like a victim,
like they are at the mercy of events and other people, with no apparent way to feel better, and
with no hope doing so.  That's never a good place to be.  Most importantly, it can cause them
to miss many opportunities to feel better.  

However, it's our thoughts about what happens that really causes how we feel.   The formula
for feelings is:   
                                         EVENT  +  THOUGHTS  =  FEELINGS  

Thoughts cause feelings, not events.  Remember one of the first algebraic formulas you were
taught?   a  +  b  =  c   Where a is a constant, and b is a variable.  If a stays the same and you
change b, c changes too.  Likewise, If an event stays the same, and you change your thoughts
about it, your feelings change, for the better or worse.

Dr. Ellis created the ABC Theory of Emotions, where A stood for an Activating Event, B stood
for the automatic and irrational Beliefs someone has about the event, and C stands for what
someone feels and does as a Consequence of their Beliefs about the Activating Event.

                       ACTIVATING EVENT  +  BELIEF  =  CONSEQUENCES (feel, do)

We all have a host of cognitive choices we make all the time, usually without realizing it, that
determine how we feel.  They include:

                     How we LOOK at what happens                                        
                     What MEANING we attach to what happens                  
                     What we FOCUS on about what happens                      
                     What we COMPARE things to                                            
                     What we EXPECT of ourselves, others and lives         
                     What we REMEMBER about the past
                     What we IMAGINE will happen next                                  
                     How much IMPORTANCE we attach to what happens
                     What we spend our time THINKING about

We have a choice because there is always more than one way to look at anything, more than
one thing that something could mean, more than one thing to focus on or compare things to,
more than one thing we could expect or imagine ahead of time, and varying degrees of
importance we could attach to what happens.  When we pick one of those many ways, we've
technically made a choice.  The way we choose often tends to be automatic and the choice we
make is one we've made the same way many times before.  That's why we tend to be relatively
unaware that we've made a choice.  However, the way we make these choices is not "cast in
stone".  We can learn to make them differently, and with practice and rehearsal, making them in
different ways can become as automatic as the old ways were.

Logically, if how we think or look at things really determines how we feel, and we have a choice
as to how we look at things, then it's also true that it's our choice how we want to feel.

The first time someone told me it was my choice how I wanted to feel, I didn't take it very well.  
You and others might not either.  People often misinterpret what is meant when someone says
that.  They often mistakenly think someone is:
   1)  Saying, "It's your fault you feel the way you do"
   2)  Saying, "There's something wrong with you for feeling that way"
   3)  Discounting the importance of some event in their life.  
        This is especially likely, for example, if a person has recently experienced the                     
         loss of a significant loved one
   4)  Excusing the behavior of the person who wronged them
That's why it's important to remember that anything we think, or end up feeling because of it is
perfectly understandable.

Developing an Internal Locus of Control means:
   1)  Learning the real cause of our feelings
   2)  Learning and remembering what our cognitive choices are
   3)  Learning to use this new knowledge to our advantage
   4)  Learning to recognize what we do or don't have control over in life
   5)  Focusing on and working with what we have control over instead of things we don't

We don't control what others think, feel, say or do.  We only control what we think, feel, say
and do.

We do little if anything in schools or anywhere else to teach or encourage young people to
have an internal locus of control.  If you listen to the way people talk, including teachers, you'll
see that we actually do quite the opposite.  The same will be true if you listen to radio or TV
personalities, or popular music.

Teaching people to have an internal Locus of Control is the single simplest and most important
thing we could teach people to do to reduce the frequency, intensity and duration of emotions
like anger, anxiety, depression, guilt, shame and loneliness in their lives.  It wouldn't require
any new teachers, classes or money for schools to do so, and it would be good for teachers to
develop an internal Locus of Control for their own sake.