Superbowl Cheesecake and Emotional Incontinence

 This morning as I was making a cheesecake for a superbowl party on Sunday, I was reminded of my opening story in my #1 bestselling book, Emotalerting.

 

 

 FROM CHAPTER ONE: Emotional Incontinence

I really did think I had matured past that type of aggression and temper-tantrumming – the adult kind – where arm-thrashing and foot-stomping are done verbally.  The man on the other end of the phone didn’t know what hit him.  He didn’t even get to say hello.  It was an appliance salesman with whom we had completed a transaction – but the outcome was less-than-desired.  My wife was attempting to work out a misunderstanding that had financial implications.  Prior to the phone call, I had been handling the minor conflict with the appliance business, but I was in the middle of making Crème Brule for a television video game tournament with friends the following night.  I was at a critical juncture in the cooking process when my wife summoned me to intercede the call. 

The conversation had reached beyond what she was able and willing to negotiate.  I was the one who had handled most of the transaction’s misunderstandings up to that point. In situations like that, we each have a role.  She handles most details and data tracking; I handle the people part – especially if there may be disharmony involved.  When I resistively but assertively took the phone from my wife, I slammed into the man with great emotional and rational force, although I am sure now that he thought of it as irrational.  I was dually franchised and disenfranchised with myself.  I didn’t yell, but my decibel level was higher than usual.  It was certainly higher than when I was trying to convince him to give us a good deal at the store two weeks earlier.  My tone was definitely different than it was during the pre-sale pleasantries we had shared at the store.  A part of me was proud of my assertiveness.  Another part of me was ashamed of it since it verged on being aggressive.  After a few minutes of getting nowhere, I let the man know we would not do business with them again and abruptly hung up the phone. 

 My wife heard the verbal transaction that was more akin to an assault.  My dualism began to bother me.  No matter how justified I thought I was in my position, the manner I handled the salesman was not justified.  I waited a few minutes and went to take a temperature check of my wife.  I wanted consolation from her.  I asked her if she still thought of me as a noble man. I  She looked back at me blankly – which matched the words that did not proceed from her mouth.  The blank look and wordless response confirmed my fear that I had not been a noble man at all.

She acted like the noble one as she poignantly told me that I knew what I needed to do.  I did know.  I already knew what I should do and I had already decided not to do it.  Then my wife’s silence and my desire to be nobler spoke too loudly for me to bear.  I reviewed some of the particulars of the transaction’s misunderstandings with my wife so my emotion could be tempered with facts.    My emotional whits came back to me and I called the salesman back.  I apologized to the man for how poorly and inappropriately I had treated him.  Both transactions (appliance purchase and verbal assault) were cleared up.  My wife heard that conversation too.  As I hung up she said to me, “That is a noble man.”

As I rehashed the incident, I was greatly disappointed and frustrated with my dualism.  It was like I was two – maybe more – men in one.  I knew better, yet I couldn’t refrain from the verbal assault I perpetrated.  As I pondered my tactics, I really did think I had matured past that type of aggression and temper-tantrumming.  The disappointment and frustration was intensified because I had just completed reading thousands of pages on Emotional Intelligence for my doctoral dissertation.  Was I really that emotionally fragile – still?  Was I really that intemperate?  How could I let myself get away from myself – and so quickly and resolutely?

Unfortunately, most of us can too easily relate to this story.  We know that there are times when we actually behave differently than how we would like to behave.  We experience sideways, off-kilter experiences that alienate us from our goals, our friends, our families and ourselves.  I call it “emotional incontinence”.  The graphic entendre is intentionally poignant because of the messes that usually result in our unplanned emotional tirades.  Emotional incontinence is a state of losing our emotional composure in spite of our best intentions to stay calm, cool and collected.  And we leave messes behind – messes in our relationships and in ourselves.

Why does this happen?  Perhaps a better question would be how does this happen?  A simple answer is that it happens internally.  Specifically it happens in your brain.  It is a brain habit.

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For Emotional Intelligence Training or Life Coaching, email Dr Carlyle at drcarlyle@drcarlyle.com