How to survive big emotions at work

I often get questions from mentees, colleagues, and friends on various career topics, but I haven’t been posting them as they are very specific or singular. That said, the question below stood out for me as something many people struggle with, and I wanted to share it with all of you. This is an area I have struggled with for my entire career and though I can’t say that I’ve mastered it, I do have a solid tool kit.

Understand there is a lot to unpack, and this is just a fraction of all that can be said on this topic. If you have additional questions, or specific areas of interest drop me a line. Send me a message through the site, social media, or email. Also, if you have any tips on how to “deal with” those big emotions that arise, let me know in the comments below!

Hey Silvia! From what I recall during our interview many moons ago, you mentioned compartmentalizing emotions when it comes to situations in a professional setting (I.e., layoffs, getting attached to candidates, absorbing energy, etc.) - my question to you: over the course of your career, you’ve mastered this skill - what is your best advice for someone who struggles with this?

I’ve given it some thought and here’s what I would say:

The Feels: Feel what you feel. There isn’t anything wrong with having big feelings. Unexpressed feelings are what get us into trouble as humans. If you are having a particularly BIG feeling at work, especially one that can be perceived as negative or explosive, this is one you will want to give yourself space to experience. Keep reading on how to begin to short-circuit this pattern if you are easily triggered at work.

In the moment, if you are feeling a big emotion come up, be it negative, a sadness that might move you to tears, etc. remember to breathe. If you have a way to do some deep breathing in the moment, that is best. A deep breath in, a slight pause at the top, a longer exhale will signal your brain that you are safe and help keep you from going into survival mode. When we are in survival mode, we respond in only one of four ways: Fight, Flight, Freeze, or Appease, which at work can be a recipe for disaster.

When you have a minute, explore the feeling and I mean explore it. Pull out a journal and notice everything that the feeling holds. How does it feel? What does it look like? Is it living in your body? Where? What color or texture does it have? During this exploration, you will want to keep breathing. Making sure you are consistently signaling your brain that exploring emotions is safe. This will give your body and mind the space to help the emotion work through your system. This is what psychologists refer to as “processing the emotion”. As an aside, this allowance, which doesn’t need to take all that long (though it may if you are new to this), will lead you to the reward of a neurochemical release that will pop you into executive function! Gotta love that! It’s like a workout for your brain.

Continuing on, once you’ve explored all aspects of the feeling, ask yourself - Is this my feeling or someone else’s? Sometimes, if we are empathetic, the feelings we experience aren’t even ours. Oftentimes, these emotions are like viruses that we catch from others. Taking time to understand the distinction between something that is ours versus not ours will help in letting go of that feeling.

The Logic: Once you’ve spent time processing, you can then take a look at the logical side of the decisions made. All decisions have one thing in common, whether it is a layoff, a rejection of the candidate, or the sunsetting of a project, these decisions are being made by HUMANS, and as such are imperfect. That said, these decisions are always “logical”. I say this because they will be made with the best information the human(s) making it has (have) at the time. And will also be made with the implicit and explicit beliefs and values of the individual and the company. Meaning? They will follow a set of rules.

You may not like the decision, but understanding it may help your logical brain signal to the emotional part, that it all makes sense. I find that if we can “make sense” of something it often dissipates the emotional charge. Have you ever noticed, when you can understand someone else's point of view, you have more capacity for compassion and understanding? I know it can suck, feeling like you are the one that always takes the high road, however, the high road (if done correctly with the processing of emotions) often leads to a more balanced state of being. And that sounds like a win to me!

The Practice: If you’ve been following along, all this hinges on our ability to keep ourselves from falling into survival brain during inopportune times at work. If this is something you struggle with, then you need to practice deep breathing on a regular basis. To help, I recommend keeping a totem. This can be a pen, a rock, a toy, jewelry something in your space, or on your person that can be a reminder to breathe deep and keep yourself in executive function.

We all have varying tolerance for what will trigger us into survival brain, and it’s our own responsibility to help rewire our system. This involves all the tools you have ever learned for habit-changing to keep yourself breathing and processing emotions in a way that signals “I am safe”. Again, this breath is a deep breath in, a slight pause at the top, and a longer exhale. Followed by a deep exploration of the feelings while separating out what’s yours versus someone else’s.

Dear friends, I hope this has helped as the start of a roadmap, or additional tools in your kit. As mentioned in the opening this just scratches the surface of this topic. I could host a multi-week course to give you more, but this is the foundation! These tweaks to how you approach emotionally charged moments at work will help you ensure a fulfilling and satisfying career. Practicing the separation of emotion from the incident will allow you to further bring your best self to work every day.