#58 | Manage Our Mindsets: Others' Actions Are Our Situation 7:10
Apr 27, 2022Watch the webclass, "4-Part Roadmap to Encourage Adulting Actions."
Download, "The Quick Start Guide to STEAR Mapping"
We must learn to manage our mindset to create the life we love that works for us. We also must encourage our autistic young adults to manage their mindset by teaching them the STEAR Mapping tool. Here's what I mean.
When we separate what happens in our lives into these five categories, the situation, the thoughts, the emotions, the actions and the results, we can figure out how our thoughts are creating our results and decide to keep them or decide to shift them.
So the situation is always neutral. It is the facts of the situation. If we were going to describe it to a court of law, these are the facts that we would present. They are always neutral. Anyone else's actions belong in this line. Anyone else's reactions belong in the situation. We cannot control anyone else's actions. So that's why they belong in the situation. However, we can control the rest.
So with our thoughts, the situation is out of our control, but our thoughts our emotions, our actions, and the results we create are all within our control. Even though our thoughts are triggered by this situation, we can take a pause and decide how we're going to think about it.
That's where our power lies. That's where we get to make the choices that will create the results that we want. Our thoughts are going to flavor our emotions. We know when we're acting from those comfortable, peaceful emotions.
Sometimes we're operating out of those uncomfortable emotions and we don't want to stop doing that. For example, if some if we lost someone that we love, and our thought is I'm going to miss them that's going to create an uncomfortable emotion of grief.
But we don't want to change that. We want to honor the person that we love, or the animal the furry thing that we love through our emotions. So our thoughts are going to flavor our emotions and we want to be aware of how that's happening.
And then of course those emotions are going to generate our actions. In the case of the grief we might cry, we might you know feel a little bit less energetic that day, we might want to, you know, recall wonderful moments that we spent together and even think about how am I going to continue without that person or that animal in my life.
These are all these wonderful, absolutely logical reactions that we are going to have that generated by the emotion of grief and those actions are incredibly valid. And the result that emotion will create is we honor that person through our grief. So we need to know what you know how all of these things fit in into our lives.
When we remember though, that others actions are out of our control, but our steer map is in our control. That's when we realize the power we have to create the life we love that works.
A recent struggle I came up against in Facebook was an autistic young adult was really sensitive to the reactions that other people have around him. So he would ask them, "What are you thinking what's going on in your head?" And so that would disturb him and his parents quite often because they would find that socially inappropriate and perhaps even dangerous if he were to confront someone who didn't regulate their own STEAR Maps particularly well.
My suggestion to that autistic young adult is to remember that other people's actions whatever they say, are out of your control. And it is your choice, how you want to how your tea is brewed, your thoughts, your emotions and your actions.
So he could think:
- "They can think whatever they want about me," and that might create a peaceful emotion. And his actions might be in wonder what they might be thinking but not worry about it. And the result would be, he would consider the other person's point of view. That's a good thing.
- He could also say, "I'm going to let other people be wrong about me. Even if they are judging me as being different or not what they expected. That's okay. I'm gonna let them be wrong about me. And hopefully that would create a feeling of calm for him. And his actions might be I'm gonna let them be wrong about whatever they want to be wrong about because, you know, there are 7.9 billion people on the planet and each of us has around 70,000 thoughts per day. That's a lot of thinking a lot of zeros in that number. We certainly can't control or manage all of anyone else's thoughts.
Let's focus on what we can control, which are our thoughts. And that would be what I would encourage our autistic young adults to practice and yet once we have done this work, we will be amazed.
To teach it, we have to practice it ourselves. So take that STEAR Map out and give it a go. Anytime you have an opportunity to pause. And consider what's happening in any situation. Write down your thoughts, your emotions, and your actions and you'll see how your results are tied back to your thoughts.
Give it a try. Bye for now.
