There isn't a day that goes by when your emotions are on vacation. No matter what you do, where you go, what you see, or whom you're talking to, emotions ride along with you.
Emotions are constantly both visible and invisible. If you are in receipt of bad news, sorrow can fill your face, or be reflected in your eyes. You may have heard that your eyes are the doorways to your inner feelings.
Do emotions matter to your health, your wellbeing?
Sure they do. How many times have you started your workday with feelings of sadness, anger, or frustration?
Each one of these emotions can be transported with you as you journey to work, arrive at work, and begin your workday. The emotion can be reflected in how you relate to your co-workers, your boss, your customers.
In fact, emotions can be transferred to your customer or client over the telephone, which is often noted by telemarketing companies in their training programs.
This training highlights that customer service telemarketers should use a mirror positioned directly where they can see their faces as they talk. The telemarketer is trained to smile as they speak to their prospective customer because your voice and facial expressions
are telegraphed over the phone. The mirror is their constant reminder to keep smiling as they talk no matter how they're feeling that day.
How You Start Your Day
If you start your day on a sour note, just remember that everybody else is going to be affected whether you realize it or not.
One of the easiest ways to positively affect your emotional
health at work is to smile, to think of positive thoughts. Don't let your negative mood not only upset you, don't let your mood upset those you come in contact with be it, colleagues or customers.
The important point to remember is that you are in charge of your emotions. You are the one who controls how you feel, and how those feelings are expressed. There is already enough performance stress at work that you don't need to create anymore.
Stress Can Affect Your Wellbeing
As we all know, stress can affect your wellbeing, and part of that stress can be your own emotions.
Here is a simple example: Unknown to a colleague, they upset you by something they did. You get angry, your blood pressure rises, and you become outwardly frustrated. Your colleague didn't even know what they did - to them, it could have been a normal action, comment, or lack of action that made you angry. There is no doubt, however, that you are in control of your emotions. If you are upset or angry, you're the one who chooses to be that way.
On the other hand, you could choose to remain calm, you could choose to ignore whatever it was that bothered you, or you could approach your colleague and calmly discuss the incident so it can be resolved immediately and not fester throughout the remainder of the day, or week.
Your Emotional Health
Emotional health at work can be affected by a host of factors including the stress you create yourself by choosing to let your negative emotions, anger, or frustration rule the day.
Elevate your feelings to the conscious level so you can more easily choose how you will deal with them on a more positive footing.
