Areas › Anger › The moment before you snap
If a river on a summer afternoon does nothing for you, use something plainer. Counting the traffic from a porch, or standing outside a shop counting how many people walk past, does the same job.
Metaphors are personal and there is no prize for liking the poetic one. Some people take to it straight away when it is a road and a stopwatch instead of water and a bank. Keep two or three images in your pocket and use whichever one lets you sit still and count without arguing with the idea.
Qur’an and Sunnah
The servants of the Lord of Mercy are those who walk humbly on the earth (Quran 25:63). Walking humbly on the earth is an ordinary picture for an ordinary practice, and there is no need for it to be beautiful to be real.
وَعِبَادُ ٱلرَّحۡمَٰنِ ٱلَّذِينَ يَمۡشُونَ عَلَى ٱلۡأَرۡضِ هَوۡنࣰ ا وَإِذَا خَاطَبَهُمُ ٱلۡجَٰهِلُونَ قَالُواْ سَلَٰمࣰ ا
The servants of the Lord of Mercy are those who walk humbly on the earth, and who, when the foolish address them, reply, ‘Peace’
Qur’an 25:63read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
What the research says
In a randomised experiment with 62 students, training people to use planned self talk protected their selective attention after their self control had already been worn down. What was prepared in advance was the wording, and the wording was what carried the attention. It was a small laboratory study, so it supports having a phrase or image ready rather than telling you which one to pick.
Gregersen J, Hatzigeorgiadis A, Galanis E, Comoutos N, Papaioannou A. (2017). Countering the Consequences of Ego Depletion: The Effects of Self-Talk on Selective Attention.. Journal of sport & exercise psychology doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
Why it works
An image you can actually see yourself in gets used, and one you have to translate gets dropped.
This one is still a draft. It is waiting on a scholar and a clinician to read it before it is published.
Near this one
Instead of marking a page, press one fingertip lightly against your knee each time you notice a thought going by. Nobody in the room will see it.
The part of you that reacts can be trained. The figure usually quoted is around eight weeks of small daily practice, not one weekend of good intentions.
Decide now what you will say when it happens, while nothing is happening. A line chosen in the calm is worth more than any resolve you can summon mid row.