Mastering Your Emotions: The Key to Self-Mastery and Personal Growth

I'd like to ship you a free copy of my book Habits of High Performers. If you come and join the 2026 goal setting workshop, I will ship you one of these today. The link is in the notes. Please come and join me to set up the very best 2026 you could imagine. If you've set up goals in the past or New Year's resolutions and they haven't substantiated, I'm here to help you across all the key pillars of your life nail your goals. I'll see you there. Welcome to Lead On Purpose. I'm James Laughlin, former seven time world champion musician and now executive coach to global leaders and high performers. Each week I'll publish a solo cast where I'll share my top high performance habits and methodologies to supercharge your life and career. If you enjoy the show, please take a short moment to subscribe and leave a rating and review. I'd greatly appreciate it. Thanks for taking the time to connect today and investing in yourself. Enjoy the show.

Are you the master of your emotions or do they get the better of you? Look, I think we're all on a journey of self mastery and trying to figure out how do we manage these emotions. And let's be honest, emotions are often what get the better of us and lead things down paths we don't necessarily want to go down. And we have these emotional defaults that when we're triggered, when somebody challenges our ego, challenges our values, points the finger at us. Often we can switch straight to an emotional default. There's a little bit of space there. For some of us it's not very big and you almost go and you flip the lid right away, but there's a little bit of space there and the power is in the pause. Look, if you want to get that little bit of extra juice in the relationship, if you want to get a little bit more joy in the work that you do, if you want a bit more influence over others, then working on emotional mastery and emotional intelligence, whatever you want to call it, can only be a good thing to me. It's so crucial that we take the time to focus on understanding what emotions are, how we manage them. You know, I talk about flipping the lid, but when you look at that from a psychological perspective, there's an actual condition where the prefrontal cortex, particularly for lots of young men, the lid, it looks like a little lid and it, when they do a brain scan, it shows up like it's flipping. When a teenage boy or a young man is flipping out Emotionally, that lid is flipping. So that's where flipping the lid comes from. But isn't it interesting? You don't need to be a teenager to flip the lid often. We're still doing that into our 30s, 40s, and beyond. I've seen it in boardrooms. I've seen CEOs flipping the lid with their assistants in front of others. Yeah, it's everywhere. I see athletes do it with their tennis rackets, beating the crap out of it or throwing their golf club. That's emotions. The greatest performers on the planet have an edge on their emotions. They are able to master those better than their opponents. Same goes for people who have enriched relationships. Same goes for people who are winning in business. Same goes for people who are influencing others significantly. They understand their emotions. They know how to manage them. They know how to develop them, and they know how to keep them in a box when required. But they also know how to let them out and express them. So I want to ask you, where are you one to ten? One being, Actually, I have no emotional understanding. I'm quite reactive. Ten, ten being, you know what? I have no room for improvement. I'm a Jedi.

Mountain yogi that doesn't have any challenges with emotions. Look, I haven't met a 10 yet in my life. And sometimes when people are a 10, they're kind of medicating to get there, smoking some stuff. So we want to be higher up that scale. We want to be anywhere between a seven and a nine. That would not be great. Am I always there? Definitely not. You know, growing up in Northern Ireland, I was a young, very passionate boy. You know, when I think of my younger years, I was always into everything, Asking questions, overly eager, impatient. And then that boiled over into teenagehood. You know, in my 20s, you know, I started to lead teams, and I didn't have a lot of the emotional mastery skills that I really needed. And, yeah, I got some good results and managed to win some national medals and world championship gold medals, but at what cost? You know, I can look back in some of those when I'm in my 20s at those times and be really unproud of how I carried myself, really unsatisfied with some of the words that I chose to use under pressure. But that's growth, right? It's like, hey, how can I be better than I was yesterday? How can I be better than I was last decade? That's that journey of, you know, you think of a stoic philosopher, it's going, how do I take responsibility? How can I respond in a way that I'm more proud of, rather than react in a way that's undignified. So understanding emotions is not the soft stuff. I hear this often when I'm working with leadership teams or I'm delivering keynotes. Now, when I talk about emotional mastery, inevitably someone will say, oh, it's soft stuff. Oh, let's get on with it. Just tell us what we need to do to win. And I will reiterate this till the cows come home. The soft stuff is the hard stuff. Working on emotions is difficult. It's ugly at times, it's very confronting. It's exhausting. It's challenging. But hey, anything worthwhile pursuing generally is difficult. The journey towards it requires a lot of determination, persistence, patience, courage even. So, my challenge to you is, let's go down that path of understanding your emotions better. And how do we do it? You're going to hear me say it again. If you've been tuning in for a while now, you'll know what one of the top keys to doing that is. Journaling. Journal how you feel. In fact, I read a study recently where a couple thousand people split them into two groups. One group was told to journal on just their feelings and how they felt. The other one was told to journal on just the time, how they spent the time during the day. And then they were both given a little, like a biopsy, like a little chunk was taken out of their arm. And the group that journaled on their feelings, they healed like 70 to 80% quicker than the other group. So by expressing your emotions, you actually improve your immune system. And hey, wouldn't we all want that? I know that here in New Zealand, the seasons are changing. Autumn is almost here, winter won't be far behind it. I often pick up a cold, which I inevitably will. It's going to happen. It's my response to that cold that I want to improve. That comes down to my immunity. So journaling on your feelings is going to help you tactically with your immune system, but it's also going to help you in the quality of your relationships. It's also going to help you in how you show up for the people that you want to show up for, whether you lead them or whether you're trying to level up yourself in your career and get better opportunities. Managing your emotions is key. Look, I had an amazing client recently call me. They gave me some pretty sad news. And that was that a member of his community, a young boy, had killed himself. And we jumped on a call, myself, my client, and a few others that had been involved a few other parents that were very concerned about their kids that had lost a young friend. And one of the things I'm about to share with you is what I shared with them. And to me, the younger we can start talking about emotions, the better. But if you haven't started really looking at it, today's the day. It's never too late. But certainly with our young kids and young citizens of the world, we want to try and equip them with understanding what emotions are, being able to label them accurately and then understand how do I actually embrace them, dance with them, manage them, put them in the box till later, or let them out and talk about them or journal about them. So there's one thing I shared. I'm going to share it with you. And before I do share it, I'm going to let you know that I don't know these people personally, and I don't get any royalties or commissions. I just think they've got a really great product that's really helpful. So this sits on our kitchen table. I'm going to lift it up for those that are viewing and those that aren't. I'm just lifting up a card deck called how do I Feel? And it's a deck of cards with emotions. And they're all for children. But in fact, when I started going through this, we take one a night, and Caroline and I sit down with Finn and look at one emotion. We talk about it. It actually defines the emotion. And then I say, when was the last time you felt that? Finn and I share that for me. Caroline shares that for her. So we start talking about emotions. It's really powerful. It's by Rebecca Lipp and Craig Phillips, and I hear 65 definitions to help children identify and understand their emotions. Why am I sharing that with you? I know that you're not a child. This podcast is not made for children. But these cards have educated me hugely. Now, I've done therapy. I have read many books. I've spent time with psychologists. Brene Brown's Atlas of the Heart. Great book. But this card deck has taught me more about myself. I'll just open it up, see what's at the top, give you an example. Okay, here's one. I'll show you. Right, so there's the image for those not watching and just listening. It's a beautiful illustration. We've got a young girl here who's looking. I mean, you'd have to take a look at it for yourself, but she's looking quite down. Something's not quite right now on the back it says remorse, right? She's looking remorseful. So imagine I've got a seven year old boy talking about remorse. Says here an uncomfortable emotion that you might feel if you've done something that you now regret or feel deeply ashamed of. Remorse is a little bit like guilt, but when you're remorseful, you feel you should make amends or say sorry. Look, there are so many emotions. There's positive ones in there, less positive ones as well. But it's about understanding emotions. And when we can label an emotion, it, it actually takes the power away, the emotional power away from it. So if you're feeling deeply hurt and you say, I feel hurt, it actually removes some of that residue, that emotional sadness and allows you to move forward. Like a great example of this was Larry. So Larry had a dream of being a broadcaster, wanted to speak on radio. And he applied for this job and was successful and got to the interview, sat down, was told, look, you're going to get the job. You're made for the job. But you know your last name, it's too ethnic. Larry was like, what? What do you mean? The guy opened up a newspaper who was hiring him, flicked through to the classifieds area and seen a little lad for King's liquor store. And he pointed out, he says, king, how does that sound for your last name? Larry says, cool, I'll take that. So young Larry King went in to speak on radio for the first time. Now, there wasn't a whole mixing suite and there wasn't people assisting him when he was going to speak. He had to turn the music down slowly, fade it out and start speaking. So as he's fading it down to say his very first word on radio, nothing comes out. He's so nervous. He's so nervous he doesn't know what to do. So he fades the music back up. The music keeps playing and he goes, okay, I'll try that again. Fades it down, fades it down. He's about to speak and he's so nervous, not a word comes out. Turns his music back up. The broadcasting owner comes running in, grabs him and says, this is radio speak. So Larry takes a breath.

Fades his music down and goes, good morning, folks. My name is Larry King. I was given that name just a few moments ago because apparently my last name was too ethnic. And this is my very first time on radio and I am nervous. And Larry King, many of us will know him as arguably one of the greatest interviewers and broadcasters of all time. What an amazing soul he was. But what he did in that moment was demonstrate to us that when you can put words to and label to the emotion you're feeling, it removes a part of that emotion. When we try to fake it, often it can get worse. So by him saying, hey, I'm Larry King and I'm nervous, he was able to carry on and never look back.

So where do you need to show up and label your emotions? Is it at home? Someone's challenged you, they're annoying you, or they're really doing something that irks you? Can you label that and say, hey, I'm feeling really annoyed, I'm feeling really hurt. I'm feeling really sad? Because as soon as you label it, it takes part of that residue away. So you can move forward, but also you can then explore and expand upon why you're feeling that way. So I hope that this solo cast has landed for you and hopefully inspired you to think, am I emotionally aware enough of what's going on? Most of us aren't. If you are, I salute you. I'm on a journey towards it. But if you snap at people, if you get short with the people that you love, if you find yourself distracted on your phone when you should be present, then you've got some work to do on your emotions. That's why I continue to work on my emotions, because I know I could be better and I want to be better. So I hope that it served you. And if there's anything in particular you would like me to talk to or talk about, or if there's a guest you would love to have me invite onto the show, please don't be shy. Reach out to my team. And as always, if you've got an event coming up or a conference or you know of someone that does and they want a speaker who speaks on leadership and mindset and being a possibilitarian, please keep me in mind. But for now, please get out there and lead your life on purpose. Thanks for tuning in today and investing in your own personal leadership. Please hit that subscribe button and I'd love if you'd leave me a rating and review. I've got some amazing guests lined up for you in the coming weeks and leaders. It's that time to get out there and lead your life on purpose.