You don't get to tell me how to respond

I'm hot tempered. Anyone who knows me well knows that I have a short fuse. As I've gotten older, I've been able to pick and choose the flames that ignite my fuse a little more. But the fact still remains that I'm hot tempered and have a short fuse. Fortunately, I don't stay angry for a long time. My anger is like a stick of dynamite. It lights, builds, crackles, explodes, then it's over. 

Now that I think about it, a lot of my emotions are that way. They aren't sustained over long periods of time. They come and they go. Irritation tends to linger a little longer than the rest of them. I've learned to short circuit my sadness. 

It took me years (and therapy and some well invested time) to come to grips with my emotions. And when I say come to grips with them, I only mean being able to identify them. There's a part of me that still doesn't believe I should experience negative emotions. I don't know why though. Maybe it's because I believe I'm supposed to be positive the majority of the time. Maybe it's because I feel like I shouldn't respond to people in ways that are not positive. Maybe it's because I feel like it's a waste of time. Maybe it's all of those things. Maybe it's none of those things. I'm still figuring that part out. 

What I realized and declared very loudly today though is I am the regulator of my emotions and my emotional responses. I noticed that people wanted to stimulate my emotions and then react when I responded to their stimuli. They want to tell me how to get mad or how excited to be or how loud to be or how loud NOT to be. 

I cuss when I'm angry. I'm loud when I'm excited. I'm even louder when I'm angry. For the first time in forever, I am ok with all of this. You don't get to interact with me AND tell me how to respond. Nope, sorry not sorry. I understand that people have a right to be treated to their preference. What I need people to also understand is that people have a right to respond as they see fit. If I know a person is not going to respond in a way that is acceptable to me, I'm not going to stimulate then. If I see that a person's response is not how I want to be responded to, I'm not going to elicit a response from them. I realize I'm oversimplifying all of this. I'm o.k. with that. 

If you know me, you know how I will respond. If you don't know me, you don't know how I will respond. Either way, the chain reaction that's set off once the interaction occurs needs to be considered. I think about it from a few different angles, situations, and scenarios. I suggest that others do as well. 

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