The Balance between Fury and Serenity

Today's morning was cool, with a lot of desire to rain because the breeze and the sky with clouds loaded with rain seemed to indicate so. Although sometimes it doesn't happen as one predicts, because the weather is so "crazy" that it can happen that in a while we have a burning sun. But the weather provoked me to go for a walk and so I did, I put on comfortable clothes and my tennis shoes to go to the gym, looked for the house keys and closed the door behind me.

I like to walk when the weather is cool, while I was walking I was remembering the things I had done in the early hours of the morning. My thoughts started to flow and they were precisely what happened in the morning with my oldest son. This week he has leave from work to stay at home because in his work environment convid19 is going around. There are many cases of colleagues who are infected and must be quarantined at home. So the management, as a preventive measure for those who are healthy, ordered the employees to stay at home. Today my son has to deliver an inventory report of the company's technological and telecommunication equipment in the western part of the country and he was going to do it by videoconference with the company's manager. When he was ready and waiting for the time for the videoconference (11 a.m.) the power went out in the area, goodbye videoconference at home, welcome stress!

Everything got complicated at that moment. The laptop didn't have much battery, so he saved the information on a flash drive. But my son was already in the grip of anxiety and started pacing back and forth around the house. Then he made a call and confirmed with a colleague who has a car to come for him and take him to work because there in that company when they need information no one stops them, no power outage, no rain, no covid19. It really is a stressful job.

I worked three years of my working life there in that company some time ago and I remember that on one occasion I had to do some work in a community two hours outside the city, but an hour away the transport could not continue because we reached a fallen bridge that crosses a river and we had to go to the community that was located on the other side of the bridge, an hour more on the road. Neither the fall of the bridge, nor other multiple situations stopped the management, since we crossed the bridge but walking and on the other side another transport of the company was waiting for us. We did this for more than three months until the bridge was fixed. Those were times of a lot of experience in terms of challenging the circumstances that prevented us from continuing with the work. And of many strong emotions that I had to manage since I was coordinating a large number of personnel, more than 250 people crossing a bridge on foot and transferring in more than 10 bus units. A lot of logistics and a lot of strong emotions to manage.

At that time I had to endure many changes in my emotions. And today as I was walking I remembered that part of my working life. Today my oldest son is experiencing it. In fact before he left for work I advised him to take it easy and he replied that I knew how stressful it was to meet with the manager because I had worked there for three years.

Being able to withstand the strong emotions to which we are subjected by the circumstances that we sometimes live is what we must learn, to have self-control is a virtue that is learned over time. It is what we call having emotional intelligence. The goal is balance, not the suspension of emotions: each feeling has its value and meaning.

A life without showing emotions, without passion would be a boring behavior of emotional neutrality, it would give the sensation of being isolated and separated from the richness of life itself. When emotions are too muted they create boredom, but the other extreme is not good either because if emotions are out of control and too extreme and persistent, they become pathological.

The art of self-soothing is a fundamental life skill. People who have learned to use breathing and relaxation strategies have succeeded, and many times they have also succeeded in calming themselves through prayer. These are strategies that are learned over time and that, when put into practice, automatically eliminate any emotional disturbance from the consciousness.

Of course, the question remains as to whether one can learn to control one's emotions. Is it really possible not to become aware of the circumstances around us that produce strong emotions, or do we simply feign serenity?

In other words: Does work stress disturb you or do you remain serene?

To conclude I will tell you that the weather changed after I came back from walking, the whole afternoon was hot with strong sun, but I still kept calm because I was alone at home.

Thanks for reading and commenting.

Thanks to my followers and sponsors for staying emotionally serene and attentive to my content. You are the best.

Lead Image from unsplash.com