Hello everyone, it's been quite a while since my last post but I've come back to share what I have learned of the mind and our emotions. This subject is something that I believe is overthought and is widely spreading today, hopefully the lesson I post here WILL BE YOUR SOLUTION. Let us begin with our first lesson...


Lesson 1: How Emotions Happen:

Think of a time where you've been upset. You felt hopeless, that life was not worth living, worthless, you had no confidence in yourself or you didn't know if you could ever get over the pain you were feeling. I'm sure all of you had issues where these emotions have occurred. My question to you is this, what causes these emotions?

Emotions are not something that manifest by themselves, they are created by thoughts. Negative thoughts will cause you negative emotions and positive thoughts will cause positive emotions. Think again about times where you have felt down, anytime you have you will be able to make the connection that there was something you were thinking about that lead you to the state you went into or are into currently. That is what I would like to teach all of you who read this how to control.

Many people going through depression or negative thoughts believe they need to find a way to control their emotions but in reality you are skipping a step. In order to control your emotions to benefit your state and your life you must learn to control your thoughts first. In order to do so I will teach you a skill I have acquired called DCD.

DCD stands for Doubt, Criticize, Decide. It is the golden rule for destroying negative thoughts and replacing them with positive ones. First you must take your thought, no matter how bad it may be, and doubt the thought that is making you upset. Next, you need to criticize and point out why the thought is not true or how to make it something that you won't let affect you. Lastly, you must "Decide" whether this problem is going to affect you any longer and if it is even worth worrying about. Once you have gone through this process, you WILL destroy that negative emotion.

Let me give a perfect example for those of you who may not understand yet, I will use one of my own personal stories.

I once was an alcoholic and I occasionally smoked pot to get rid of my problems. One night I had went to a party with the sole intention of getting as high and drunk as I possibly could. When I woke up the next morning I was shown videos of the way I was acting and it disgusted me and it made me feel worse about myself, for that I decided to quit.

To quit, I used DCD. I doubted the thoughts I was having about needing alcohol for my problems, then I criticized it. I knew smoking and drinking wasn't going to help me, it only held off the problems I was having, thinking about it that way made me see that I did not need it despite whatever my problems may have been. Lastly I decided. Am I going to keep drinking my problems away, or am I going to get off my ass and solve them? At that moment, the thought was destroyed. Since then I have not had the urge to go back to drinking or smoking because I KNOW it will not solve anything and they will only have negative effects on my body.

To close here I will summarize my lesson to you. In order to control your emotions that are going out of control, you need to control your thoughts. Doing so will allow you to control how your emotions work. Remember to use DCD whenever you are troubled by thoughts no matter how big or small the problems may be.

If any of you have any questions for me, please feel free to post a reply on this post or be sure to send me a message on discord. My discord is Tarquin#9472 and yes I am on the dollars server also if you'd like to find me there.

I hope this first lesson will help all of you. I will post another in due time.

Thank you Tarquin! I'll try to use that next time overwhelming negative thoughts find me! I'll look forward to the next lesson :-)

Lesson 2: Applying DCD to Traumatic Memories

This lesson may be a bit confusing at first so if a second read through is needed then by all means, it will benefit. In this lesson we are going to go over Memory Windows and Memory Anchors, a concept I picked up recently and I believe is very interesting. My first question for you is this, what are memories?

Memories are images and contents of vast information stored in our brain, they are created from prior experiences. How a memory affects you can impact your emotions based on the experience you have with memories, they are essentially like the thoughts we went over previous and how they can cause negative or positive emotions.

For the most part, our brains going through memories are subconscious and involve Memory Anchors and Memory Windows. A Memory Anchor is an object, person, or place that triggers past experiences and events from your past. Memory Windows are when you see this object, person, or place and thinking about it opens a window of past memories and experiences.

This process is used throughout our daily lives, whether or not you even realize it. Many of the reasons you can remember basic information about the world around you are based on these two factors.

For example, let's say I go to school and I see a friend in the hallway. The friend in this case is a memory anchor. When I see the friend, I can remember his/her name, likes, dislikes, and other features about her just by seeing her walk in the hallway. Subconsciously, my brain is recalling who she is, but it's at such a fast rate that I wouldn't really notice it.

Now for Memory Windows, these are a bit different. Let's say I go on vacation to the place where I proposed marriage to my significant other. If I were to go back to that place, it would trigger memories from that specific time in my life at that specific place. That is the difference between Memory Anchors and Memory Windows.

Some of you may be reading and wondering, "How does this protain to the lesson on Traumatic Memories?" The answer lies in the Traumatic Memories you are facing.

Memory Windows and Memory Anchors apply to DCD in a very productive way. These methods can be used to wipe away fears and sad times you think about on occasion and can entirely eliminate the problems if you go about it in the right manor.

Let's give an example of where this can be applied. Recently my friend in real life had been shot in the arm during a robbery at her place of work. After that had happened, she constantly began thinking of when she got shot every time she went back to her workplace. In this case, her work was the Memory Anchor, going there or it being brought up in conversation would open a Memory Window that brought back all of those traumatic memories and made her anxious to be around the workplace again.

How did she get over this? She used DCD. She doubted the reasons for her to be anxious, that she was shot. She then criticized the idea that now this place is dangerous just because one bad thing happened to her, it did not mean that if she went back to work it was just going to miraculously happen again and she was aware of that. Finally she decide, decided whether or not this one bad experience was going to cripple her of being able to go back to work, get paid, and provide for herself once more. This was a perfect example of how DCD can dramatically destroy your negative thoughts and replace them with positive thoughts that reward you with confidence.

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That will be our lesson for today. Thank you for reading and please be sure to let me know if there are any further questions you have about our previous lessons and how they can be applied to your experiences. Once you break the negative thoughts, they will lead you to a much healthier and happier state of mind.