I should never be complaining about anything. I’ve got my health, an amazing wife, good friends, a great job, a growing relationship with Christ and a Pug that’s about as awesome as they come. But, for some reason that doesn’t stop me from getting down on myself sometimes and feeling like I’m doing it all wrong.

I don’t even know why and how it happens, but it does. In my head my emotions are telling me that I’m not doing enough, that other people are doing things that are better and that my relationships should be something different than they are. It’s hard to stop these thoughts from getting into my head and unfortunately it’s a reality that I have to deal with.

Depending on what’s going on in my life sometimes my emotions can be better or worse, higher or lower. One day my emotions can motivate me and another day they can make me feel worthless. My emotions can be all over the place and I guess the thing I’ve learned is that they’re always going to be changing. I think this happens to a lot of people and it’s a major driver why so many people are on antidepressant or other mood-altering meds (which admittedly I was on a few years back).

Here are some things I do to keep my emotions in check:

– I make sure I’m getting the sleep that I need for the week. The number one way for me to get in a bad emotional mess is lack of sleep. This might be different for you but you need to learn what you need in your life and what you don’t. Here’s some more detail about how I set these types of boundaries in my life.

– I share how I’m feeling with other people as much as possible. This is something that’s new for me and it still doesn’t feel natural but it always helps. No one likes to seem like they’re vulnerable but letting someone else know how you’re feeling is the first step in healing.

– I make time for prayer as much as I can. As a follower of Christ I rely on prayer and it’s not always easy to make the time. I’m working on proactively making time in the mornings for some silent prayer time so that I’m able to get my day started with some quality time with my man Jesus.

– I exercise a few times a week and now that my toe is healed up after breaking it I’m starting to get to the point to where I can crank out some decent morning runs. I run in the morning because it’s when it energizes me for the rest of the day and I don’t have to squeeze it in later, but that might be different for you.

– I’ve started to plan more things on a proactive basis instead of just hoping that they’ll fall into place. I’m all about being spontaneous, but nothing will cause more problems than not planning out your week and workdays at least a little bit a little in advance. You don’t have to get too granular, but at least know what’s going on at a high level.

I could keep going on but this should give you a good idea of the amount of time and effort it takes me to keep my emotions in check (and sometimes they’re still really hard to deal with). I just never want to be in a situation where I feel like they’re getting the best of me. That’s how larger problems get started and it’s all a downward spiral from there.

Listen to what your emotions are telling you and do your best to understand them, but don’t let them control you.