Every emotion needs to be introspected to identify the deep values at stake. Don’t misunderstand this advice. I am not recommending that whenever you get triggered, you should stop whatever you are doing to go to your desk to work through an introspection tactic.

My advice is a principle: you need to introspect your emotions so that you can make all of your values explicit, and thereby make rational decisions based on what matters most to you. Sometimes understanding your emotions is fast and easy, and sometimes it takes years of therapy. But ultimately, to live a happy, productive life that includes great relationships, you need to understand all of your emotions, especially the ones that start out as mysterious. How and when you do this thinking work is a tactical question that depends on the circumstances.

In particular, when you are in a performance situation, you do not have time to do that thinking. When you are performing, you are cashing in on the results of previous thinking to guide your action in real time to achieve some purpose. If you get triggered by a surprising or inappropriate emotion, it interferes with the flow of the performance. You need a tactic to help you return to the purpose and get back into the flow. This applies to any kind of performance situation, whether you are in the middle of a tennis game, speaking before an audience, or even having a planned difficult conversation with a loved one.

The 5-4-3-2-1 Switch

“Breathe” is usually the top piece of advice for regaining your composure when you get triggered in the middle of something. It is effective if you know how to breathe from the diaphragm. I suggest adding a little introspection in my article on “Three Steps to Calm Down.” But I’m always on the lookout for other tactics that require less training. Recently my tennis coach gave me a great one. I’m calling it the “5-4-3-2-1 Switch.”

If you get emotionally triggered — or self-critical — or distracted in the middle of a performance, stop to do these 5 perceptual identification tasks:

• Name 5 things you can see here and now.
• Name 4 things you can hear here and now.
• Name 3 things you can feel here and now.
• Name 2 things you can smell here and now.
• Name 1 thing you can taste here and now.

Then you can return to your original purpose, having cleared the distraction from your field of attention.

This tactic is easier for most people to execute than breathing from the diaphragm because we’ve all been doing this task since we learned to talk. My coach says that he taught this to a young player he works with who gets very angry and self-critical when she misses a shot. She used to do all 5, but now he just calls out one number, and she replies with 2 things she can smell or 4 things she can hear, etc.

How this works

I call this a switch because it is the switch of attention that makes the difference.

When you are triggered, your field of attention is filled by the distraction. This immediately creates a problem because whatever is in your field of attention at one moment causes the memory-affect system to pop related ideas and feelings into the field of attention the next moment. And all of this negativity gets in the way of your original purpose. When you are playing tennis, you can’t be strategic in your serve. When you are speaking, you can’t deliver to the point effectively. And when you are having a difficult conversation with a loved one, you can’t stay connected.

What to do? You need to break that attention cycle immediately. That’s what a quick timeout to do the 5-4-3-2-1 switch does for you. By deliberately turning your attention to perceptually available stimuli, you reset much of the content of your field of attention. By directing yourself to name them, you ensure that the memory-affect system sends up neutral material instead of more of the triggering content.

The secret ingredient

Of course, breaking the cycle is not enough. You then need to re-institute your purpose. If you’re playing a tennis match, your purpose is to follow whatever strategy you had in place to win! You can remind yourself and be ready for the next serve. If you’re speaking to an audience, your purpose is to connect and communicate your message. If you prepared for the performance, that purpose is clear and is easy to reactivate.

On the other hand, if you’re having a difficult conversation with a loved one, you may not know the top purpose to keep in mind. Most people don’t. This has turned out to be one of the subjects we talk about in the Thinking Lab. Thinking Lab members often want advice on how to think about a people problem. I’ve found three fundamental principles that apply to all difficult conversations:

• You need to be emotionally grounded, and maintaining your emotional composure is your top priority no matter what the other person says or does.
• You need to draw out and keep in mind their value context, so that it is clear you want only solutions that are rationally selfish for both of you.
• You need to “let them do their own thinking” as Catherine Dickerson coined the phrase — you cannot solve their problems for them.

So when do you introspect the emotions?

Although this tactic can get you back in the game, it does not solve the bigger problem. It does not stop you from getting triggered in ways that can impact your ability to perform. Another time, you might not have the presence of mind to use this tactic, and you will blow up your game, your speech, or your relationship. The long-term solution is to develop skills and integrate your values so that you get triggered rarely.

This little tactic helps you take only the first step in that long-term process, which is to identify explicitly that you were emotionally triggered. When you then switch your context, you defer the real work of introspection. This tactic addresses the inconvenience of the emotions without suppressing, dismissing, or denying them. That sets you up to retrospect the incident and untangle your emotions after the fact. That is what you will need to do if you want to perform better over time.

Tennis and speaking professionals work on their mental game. They prepare not just their skills, but their mindset for performance. They do this in part by reviewing past performances and identifying trigger points that they need to address. You can do the same. In particular, as part of your preparation for a difficult conversation, you will almost certainly need to introspect your emotions so that you can show up without an enemy image in your head.

During the preparation phase, I recommend that you do drop everything and introspect, especially if any intense or mysterious emotion pops up. This is a critical reason for scheduling time to prepare. It is challenging to do that thinking work on your feet; instead, do it at your desk.

That said, any performance also takes skill. In particular, difficult conversations take skill at staying grounded when another person is aggressive or defensive. It is a real-time skill that you can learn in my Better Relationships intensive.