The election is analogous to running your own internal tradeoffs in your life - and you have to vote one way or the other...and try to gain control...

(Click on the title of the post to read the entire post.)

Of course, no one knows for certain which Presidential candidate would have been best.

They may think (translation: believe) that they know the future for certain, but...

While I am commenting on politics in the US, I am more interested in how it adds light and an opportunity in our own internal (discipline, emotional) struggles in life that occur every day in one's life, in attempting to satisfy all "sides".  

THE ELECTION WAS A PERFECT ILLUSTRATION OF...

As to the election itself, it was a perfect illustration of what is written about in the books The Righteous Mind and The Believing Brain (the links are to my summaries, and then to the books).  It was a perfect illustration of the illusion that "emotional reasoning" tells us what is "the truth" and of the thinking errors that all human's brains will be subject to.  (If you are not human and are above it all, you need read no further, but if are human, even though tremendously smart and intelligent and thinking you are objective, these errors will occur for you, for sure.) 

And, of course, the result of the election (either way) would not actually turn out to be the disaster ((if you are on the losing side) that you worry about nor the new perfect world that will now come about (if you are on the winning side).   (In Zen Habits, he writes Compassion In The Midst Of Madness, which certainly is the better way to go!)

BUT, FIRST, ONE MUST LEARN THIS...

But the case is, whether in politics or internally in your life, you always will benefit by knowing how the mind works AND how to work it, for it is the instigator of the emotions and the "great guide" is still what one needs to come to the workable actions that will make the difference.

As I am writing my book (working title The Self Control Book), I see that the higher brain MUST sufficiently comfort or de-discomfort the primitive mind, fill enough of the basic needs, and assure the primitive mind of the safety and survival of oneself, first, before we can manage it.  

If you can't start the day totally grounded and sufficiently "safe", with some specific minimal needs filled, you will have a day that is uncertain and anxious, be less effective, and/or have a day where you have trouble even starting up very well!!!   

IN THE MOMENT, DO THIS...

Later in the day, if something puts us off our emotional or physical stasis, we must address that and make the best of it by, guess what: engaging the higher brain such that you can return ASAP to The Zone.  If you stay in the "offness", you will wander around, likely getting nowhere, trying to unthinkingly solve the "problem" (of "offness").  

So, the wise person knows that at the start of the day and each. and every time, an "offness" occurs, he/she must use this simple system:  Pause, breathe(!), think (engage the higher brain).  Regardless of what is going on, the wise person virtually ALWAYS does The Pause - it never makes sense not to do it!

The process is The Prime Process (procedure) that a person must have down pat, completely clearly, completely installed, for it is the beginning that leads to things being much more workable, and ultimately to a much better life.  

To be able to implement a strategy at the time that it is needed, one must design ahead of time what one will do, clarify the why and the how and then practice the process until it is fully installed and always used, until it is automatic and effortless. (An example of the type of thinking is illustrated in The Skill And The Process For Effective Change.)  

We must always decide ahead of time and be very clear as to what to do.  The pause-breathe-think is the one system design that is the most important of all of the system designs that create a better and easier life.  (A process or a procedure is a system, which is simply a series of steps in a specific sequence that will lead to a desired results.)  [Government could use a lot of improved and definite well-designed systems!.  But for now, you should concentrate on doing a magnificent job of creating great systems for your own good!] 

THE MORNING SYSTEM - GETTING IT INTO EFFECT AND EFFECTIVE

And the system design that I am now working on re-designing with more thought and better knowledge (from studying this more!) is 

1) to have the "perfect", for me, start of the day design, that will launch me into the day and way of being that will best serve me AND 

2) to utilize the vital gold time with absolute focus (allowing no, zero, distractions) that the day starts off with.  

Yes, the rest of the day matters, but, if you do this process, you will have already lived a magnificent (about) 5 hour day that has more value than all of the week's afternoon and evenings added together, in total.  

WHERE THERE IS MASSIVE IMPORTANCE, MORE PERFECTING IS NECESSARY!

Where there is great possible return, that is repeated over and over again in life, we must focus and perfect the system that will gain that for us.  Besides the systems for emotional regulation and management, the two systems above are of the highest return and very much worth perfecting.

Toward the end of bettering what I do, I am revising my early day, and several considerations to pay attention to. 

In the start of the day, I must "feed the elephant" (my body and vulnerable primitive mind) what it needs to feel sufficiently satisfied AND safe (which includes being confident about this day).  And I know that the design will not be the "perfect" model that I want, but it will be one that works for the better.  

SHOOTING TOO SOON FOR PERFECTION

My earlier conception of the perfect model was to "get up", take care of what is needed for 5 minutes and then go off to exercise (without having eaten, so that I could burn off more fat)...and so on.  But there was a problem that occurred at the border between my thinking (called the "metaphysical" world, not of the physical world of reality) and getting over the border into physically producing the results. It didn't work! 

There was a "design flaw" where I forgot (or overlooked) some details in the causal chain, at first, viewing it too simply, this way:

Five minute routine --> exercise for 30 minutes --> do some perfect grounding --> ....

Instead,  it looked more like this:

Five minute routine. --> need to satisfy body/primitive mind enough so it is not stuck --> then...

I forgot what happened right after the five minutes, next in the series of steps.

I also forgot that the rewiring of the brain is gradual (not metaphysically instant!), It is a bit like developing muscles, where one must build up one's strength until one can handle bigger weights (and not just because you decided in your mind to be physically stronger).  

So, I may still get to the point of doing what I think will be the best (the 5 minutes, or so, then exercise) routine, but not now.  But that's just fine, as I am making more progress.  

My main necessity is 

1) to have a great launch of a conversation for the day and 

2) to limit, to less than 30 minutes (for now), my necessary physical and mental transition from sleeping to launching the day start - which includes a timer being set as a physical cue AND still allowing myself to explore a few minutes of a high interest email or idea,  But before allowing any exploration and potential for wandering, I've set the rule to ONLY classify, without exceptions, in less than 5 minutes, all of the emails I will read or might wish to read (into a "Sure" box and a "High" box, the latter of which I hardly ever get to).  In this way, I never get caught up into a mindless process of wandering about exploring things without a sense of balance or time. 

[I also satisfy my curiosity and exploration inclination by setting it up so I can do all I want of that, but only in the evening - and only if it fits.  This, essentially, "flips my day" from doing all that I'm interested in in the morning, which pushes out my higher productivity time, to doing it in the evening if there is enough time left over - the end result is that I get the absolute value of the gold hours and I don't allow the less important to push out the most important due to lack of time!!!!]

So, as is more realistic, I am building from some initial doable habits/changes to some bigger ones later on, but getting a lot of benefits from the initial changes, patiently considering the reality of time and that all things take time.  I will simply take the amount of time needed to gradually and effectively build up to greater and greater things.  

OH, AND ANOTHER DETAIL

Oh, and I also never really got around to doing the strategy that many experts recommend in morning routines: to do  extensive outloud reading of various inspirational materials, intentions, declarations, etc. that might take up to 30 minutes or so.  Bottom line I needed to cut it down to a few minutes of exactly what I needed to hear and install in my conversation for the ideal strong day.  (I'll give you a copy of it when I get it to the level I want it.). 

It is true, to some extent I am "letting my feelings" govern to some extent,  but limiting them by a set, decided system, until I get better and develop more muscle.  Those who let their feelings run their lives are doomed to using the limited thinking of the primitive mind and the outdated and/or insufficient impulses and non-thinking of that lower brain....

SO, THE BOTTOM LINE... 

We need to use excellent operating knowledge to create a way to implement "self control" so that we can get more of what we want in life.  To do that, our higher brain must devise ways to get the workable behavior actually done, given that there is often "another side" that means well but will be pushing for a counterproductive behavior, putting up "resistance", or caught up in a negative emotion. 

The "art of self management" lies in increasing the strength of the side toward what works, such that it overcomes the primitive mind's push for something else.  But if we don't fill enough of what the primitive mind wants, it will push much more strongly and often win (where we lose).  

The art is in increasing the power of the "good" side and diminishing the power of the "opposing" side.  In my study of Navy Seals, one key distinguishing factor is that they realize that many primitive mind signals (and limits) are not accurate and/or not true and, accordingly, that they can be ignored or lessened - the Seals are beyond operating reactively but have arrived at actually proactively insert thinking with the knowledge of how things actually work to make decisions that are for their best benefit.  They realize that there is nothing to be afraid of and that "the force" on the other side is not legitimate (or is much weaker).  

Part of what us ordinary people need to see is that most of "signals" that cause us to give in to not doing what we should best do are illegitimate and/or very weak, and therefore very handleable.  It is as if we were trembling before the massive voice of the Wizard Of Oz, who was actually a wimp behind the curtain with a loud microphone...  The Navy Seals (and ourselves eventually will) see that there is no true power on the other side....  

The book about all of this, hopefully, will explain and make this really, really clear AND have you truly and easily becoming a master of self control and accordingly a Master Of Life.

(A bit of a disjointed piece, but I hope you get the ideas from it.) 

_________________

And, of course, what you should do with this is develop for yourself a great system for launching a powerful day.  See all the videos and examples of morning routines to copy or revise from in the piece The Morning Ritual - Launching Yourself Into Creating A Great Day.