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Instant Emotional Power Workbook

1© 2007 by Jonni La Force All rights reserved

We Begin With An Exercise

Wake up! Pay attention!

Where are you right now? Describe your surroundings out loud.

What is happening right now? What is happening in this moment?

You are becoming aware in this moment. You are waking up to this moment.

You are now briefly leaving your past. You are now briefly leaving your future.

Welcome to your moment.

Welcome to now.

Now that youʼre here, you are ready to begin. You are going to learn some very simple yet very powerful, fail-safe techniques for using and transforming your emotions.

You are going to learn several different ways to work with and change your emotions right now. Letʼs begin with a basic foundation from which to apply these techniques.

Wake up!



Are You The Master Of Your Emotions? Ask yourself:

• Am I the master of my emotions? If I am not the master of my emotions, than who is?

• Is someone I know master of my emotions? • Are my mom and dad the masters of my

emotions? If they just hadnʼt done this or that, or if they had done this or that, then would I be happy?

• Is someone else in your life in charge of your feelings?

• Is your job the master of your emotions? If I just had a better job I wouldnʼt be so stressed.

• Is your bank account the master of your emotions? If I just had more money I would feel so much better.

And so on and so forth, until itʼs always something outside of you that is responsible for how you feel right now. And itʼs usually more than one person, more than one institution, more than one situation.

So again, ask yourself:

Are all the people in my world, all the institutions, all the situations in my experience, masters of my emotions?

Who is the master of your emotions?



Who decides how I feel right now?

• Is it the guy at work? • Is it the phone company? • Is it your parents from decades ago? • Is it the person in the car cutting you off?

Because if it is, why don't you call up your parents or that uncle who molested you and just ask them if they would mind deciding that from now on you get to feel happy?

• Why don't you chase down that guy who cut you off in traffic and ask him to make you happy?

• Why don't you go to the president of the company and ask them to make your job less stressful?

• Why don't you go ask your child, can you please make me calm?

Do you see the point?

This is how ridiculous it is for you to act as if anything or anyone other than yourself is the master of your emotions!

Is someone else in charge of how you

feel right now?

WARNING: Shocking questions



You Decide How You Feel Right Now

Do “unasked for” emotions mean youʼre not in control?

Now you know you already are the master of your emotions. But wait, youʻre thinking, what about all the times I feel stressed?

• Or angry? • Or depressed? • Or lonely? • Or any kind of emotional pain?

What about all those times?

After all, you never consciously choose to feel pain. No one ever says, “I feel fine right now, but I think Iʼll just get terribly upset over nothing.”

And all those things on the outside really seem to be stressful, or tragic, or painful in some way. You experience emotions, popping up unbidden, seemingly in response to outside stimuli.

So what about those times?

Doesnʼt that prove that you are not master of your emotions?



Let's really think about that experience of unasked for feelings. What your mind is really pointing out is that in order for you to feel in control of your emotions you must never have a single emotion without consciously deciding to feel it first.

Iʼm going to repeat that last sentence because this is how most of us have been acting.

In order for me to feel in control of my emotions, I must never have a single emotion without consciously deciding to feel it first.

Well, I'm sorry but the subconscious and conscious minds just don't work that way.

Have you ever heard someone say something funny and you immediately laughed? Did you first consciously decide to laugh?

Have you ever witnessed a car accident and immediately felt fear or upset? Did you consciously decide to feel afraid or upset?

Since the answer to both these questions is no, doesn't that prove that you aren't master of your thoughts and feelings?

No. Because being master of your emotions does not mean you only have emotions that you consciously decide to have. Being master of your emotions means exercising, using and working with your thoughts and feelings in this moment.

This is a very common false

assumption, most people don’t even know they have!

Being master of your emotions means

exercising, using and working with your

thoughts and feelings in this moment.



You Can Shift Your Reality and Your Feelings In An Instant When you begin to feel and use your emotions, not only can you transform your emotions, but you can even transform the reality that creates the emotions. And you can do both of these in an instant!

Doesn't the emotion appear in an instant?

It can disappear in an instant too!

If that last feeling appeared in an instant, then the next feeling can appear in an instant! If that stress appeared in an instant, then the calm can appear in an instant too.

Are you familiar with this experience outlined so well in the classic story of The Cookie Thief? I will reprint it right here to remind you of the powerful lesson of this simple, yet entertaining story.

The Cookie Thief“Iʼll tell you a story,” said Andy. “I had a train to catch. I arrived at the station. I was about twenty minutes early. Iʼd got the time of the train wrong. I suppose, it is at least equally possible,” he added after a momentʼs reflection, “that British Rail had got the time of the train wrong. Hadnʼt occurred to me before.”

“Get on with it,” Francis laughed.“So I bought a newspaper, to do the crossword, and went to the buffet to get a cup of coffee.”



“I am also,” said Andy, “buying some cookies. I like them. Laden with all these new possessions, I go and sit at a table. And donʼt ask me what the table was like because this was some time ago and I canʼt remember. It was probably round.”

“All right.”

“So let me give you the layout. Me sitting at the table. On my left, the newspaper. On my right, the cup of coffee. In the middle of the table, the packet of cookies.”

“I see it perfectly.”

“What you donʼt see,” said Andy, “because I havenʼt mentioned him yet, is the guy sitting at the table already. He is sitting there opposite me.”

“Whatʼs he like?”

“Perfectly ordinary. Briefcase. Business suit. He didnʼt look,” said Andy, “as if he was about to do anything weird.”

“Ah. I know the type. What did he do?”

“He did this. He leaned across the table, picked up the packet of cookies, tore it open, took one out, and…”

“What?”

“Ate it.”

“What?”

The story of “The Cookie Thief”



“He ate it.”

Francis looked at him in astonishment “What on earth did you do?”

“Well, in the circumstances I did what any red-blooded Englishman would do. I was compelled,” said Andy, “to ignore it.”

“What? Why?”

“Well, itʼs not the sort of thing youʼre trained for, is it? I searched my soul, and discovered that there was nothing anywhere in my upbringing, experience, or even primal instincts to tell me how to react to someone who has quite simply, calmly, sitting right there in front of me, stolen one of my cookies.”

“Well, you could…” Francis thought about it. “I must say Iʼm not sure what I would have done either. So what happened?”

“I stared furiously at the crossword,” said Andy, “couldnʼt do a single clue, took a sip of coffee, it was too hot to drink, so there was nothing for it. I braced myself. I took a cookie, trying very hard not to notice,” he added, “that the packet was already mysteriously open….”

“But youʼre fighting back, taking a tough line.”

“After my fashion, yes. I ate the cookie. I ate it very deliberately and visibly, so that he would have no doubt as to what it was I was doing. When I eat a cookie,” said Andy, “it stays eaten.”



“So what did he do?”

“Took another one. Honestly,” insisted Andy, “this is exactly what happened. He took another cookie, he ate it. Clear as daylight. Certain as we are sitting on the ground.”

Francis stirred uncomfortably.

“And the problem was,” said Andy, “that having not said anything the first time, it was somehow even more difficult to broach the subject the second time around. What do you say? ʻExcuse me…I couldnʼt help noticing, er…ʼ Doesnʼt work. No, I ignored it with, if anything, even more vigor than previously.”

“My, my…”

“Stared at the crossword again, still couldnʼt budge a bit of it, so showing some of the spirit that Henry V did on St. Crispinʼs Day…”

“What?”

“I went into the breach again. I took,” said Andy, “another cookie. And for an instant our eyes met. Just for an instant. And we both looked away. But I am here to tell you, that there was a little electricity in the air. There was a little tension building up over the table. At about this time.”

“I can imagine.”

“We went through the whole packet like this. Him, me, him, me…”



“The whole packet?”

“Well, it was only eight cookies, but it seemed like a lifetime of cookies we were getting through at this point. Gladiators could hardly have had a tougher time.”

“Gladiators,” said Francis, “would have had to do it in the sun. More physically grueling.”

“There is that. So. When the empty packet was lying dead between us the man at last got up, having done his worst, and left. I heaved a sigh of relief, of course. As it happened, my train was announced a moment or two later, so I finished my coffee, stood up, picked up the newspaper, and underneath the newspaper…”

“Yes?”

“Were my cookies.”

“What?” said Francis. “What?”

“True.”

“No!” She gasped and tossed herself back on the grass laughing. She sat up again. “You complete nitwit,” she hooted, “you almost completely and utterly foolish person.”



As you can see illustrated in the story, Andyʼs reality changed in an instant, thus changing his feelings from angry victim, to guilty thief.

You are going to learn ten simple ways to transform your reality and your feelings in an instant, just like Andyʼs experience. Only you are going to be acting purposefully.

After all, this is your moment, your emotions. And when you work with your emotions, you take your foot off the brake, harnessing every bit of energy or power available to you right now.

“...reality changed in an instant.”



The First StepThe first step is to stop fighting the emotion!

When treating my clients over the years the first thing I tell them is to embrace the emotion. They walk up crying, and they are wiping the tears, doing everything they can to hold them back, which is impossible.

When treating my clients over the years the first thing I tell them is to embrace the emotion. They walk up crying, and they are wiping the tears, doing everything they can to hold them back, which is impossible.

Notice if you are fighting the emotion.

Stop. Just embrace it.

How do you embrace it? Begin by simply noticing the emotion. Sit back and observe what you are feeling.

Let it be there. Let the tears come, let the anger surge, let the stress tense up your muscles. Let the loneliness fill you with that horrible aching need. Let the loss create that endless pit of emptiness in your stomach. Allow yourself to be there, with your emotions.

Important note: notice if you are creating another level of bad feelings on top of the first feeling, creating a tangled web of super-stacked states.

Stop fighting the emotion and embrace it

It’s important to notice if you’re feeling bad about

feeling bad



Example: For years I struggled with anger and I always felt guilty and bad about being so angry. It seemed impossible to move out of all the bad feelings - the anger, the guilt, the shame - into the good feelings, because there were just so many layers of bad feelings.

You must wrap the bad feeling in love, acceptance or understanding.

A good way to do this is to imagine someone else is experiencing this feeling. Pick someone from the following list. You will know who is the most powerful for you in this moment.

• A small child • Your best friend • Someone you hold dear • Yourself observed from the point of view of a kind

stranger • Yourself being observed from the point of Jesus,

Buddha, God, or a higher power.

Imagine you see whomever you have picked from the above list going through this pain, or stress, or anger, going through this feeling. Imagine what you would say to this person you have so much affinity for. Or if you picked yourself being observed from someone elseʼs point of view, imagine what this kind, infinitely wise being would say to you.

Would you berate a child for feeling lonely?

Would you tell your best friend that is wasnʼt okay for them to feel depressed or angry in the same situation? And make them feel guilty about feeling angry or depressed?

Wrap the ‘bad’ feelings in a

positive emotion

Would you berate a child for feeling

lonely?



Or would you sympathize with them and maybe even relate some times that you had the same experience? Would you explain how you could imagine yourself having the same reaction in the same situation, thus demonstrating empathy?

Because you can create a level of understanding and offer it to yourself.

Notice how easily this allows you to wrap the feeling in love and acceptance. This insures that you are embracing the feeling and not creating multiple layers. Keeping it at one bad feeling. One bad feeling is much easier to get out of then ten bad feelings, of course.

One more reason to embrace the feeling is because, as I have explained to my clients, feelings are like little children. What happens if a parent ignores their child?

“Mom…………………….Mom……………Mom…………Mom……… Mom…..Mom…Mom, MomMOMMOMMOMMOM!!!!”

The child escalates their attempt at getting the motherʼs attention and their pleas become more frantic and insistent. It is the same with the bad feelings. They become greater and greater, more overwhelming until you can no longer ignore them and they seem to be the only thing you can ever feel.

So embrace it. Let it be.



The Second StepThe next step after you have embraced your painful feeling, wrapped it in love and acceptance, is to thank your subconscious, or your self, for creating this feeling.

The majority of the bad feelings humans experience are healthy or normal reactions to unhealthy situations. And without the ability to feel these kinds of emotions, you would not be a good mother, sister, wife, friend, husband, brother, son, etc. You would be a sociopath if you didnʼt have the ability to experience these kinds of reactions to crappy situations.

Think of the role these negative emotions play in your ability to display empathy. Or the role they play in keeping you out of danger. Think of how they alert you to a poor choice or wrong path. And how all those you love benefit from these abilities.

Now you can be profoundly grateful for these feelings.

Let this guide you to appreciate or see the beauty in such painful emotions. Seeing the beauty in such painful emotions is also a good thing to wrap the bad feelings in.

Thank your subconscious for this feeling

Now you can be profoundly grateful

for all your emotions



The Third StepOkay, so now you have embraced the feelings and made sure there is only one level of negative emotion.

Now you want to identify what you are feeling. Just put a name to the emotion. Are you feeling depressed? Lonely? Loss? Stressed? Angry?Frustrated? Fear?(Refer to the Feeling Words List for help if you like http://www.eqi.org/fw.htm)

If you cannot put a specific name to it, call it Pain. Because thatʼs what it is. Some kind of emotional pain.

Once you are fully aware of what you are feeling, and have named it, ask yourself:

“Do I want to feel different right now?

Ask it out loud:

Do I want to feel different right now?

Will you accept peace right now? Will you accept the feeling of love right now? Will you accept the feeling of happiness right now? Will you accept a feeling of calm right now? Will you accept a feeling of choice right now? Will you accept a feeling of abundance right now? Will you accept a feeling of freedom right now?

http://www.eqi.org/fw.htm






Ask yourself how you want to feel in this moment and pick a clear emotion to move into.

Recognize where you are and choose where you want to be.

This is it. Youʼve laid the foundation. Your moment has already begun to change.

You are now ready to use one of the specific techniques listed below to get exactly the emotion you want.

Realize that although I state a specific emotion to move out of and a specific emotion to move into, every one of these techniques can be modified/used to move out of any negative emotion into any positive emotion.

This is it. You’ve laid the foundation.

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