EDIT: I modified how I present the Method slightly. Please see the new version of this page and the updated series on implementing the Method. The next step after awareness is to plan -- in particular, to conceive of new environments, beliefs, and behaviors that are consistent with each other and what you can't or won't change to replace the old ones and designed to bring about emotions you want. Choosing environments, beliefs, and behaviors to bring about the emotions you want leads you to live according to your values, nobody else's. It makes you resilient to feeling bad and to some extent to other people's influence Choosing them consistent with each other means you will feel reward once the emotions become consistent with them.…

EDIT: I modified how I present the Method slightly. Please see the new version of this page and the updated series on implementing the Method. The Method's first two steps -- knowing your emotional system and understanding your current emotional cycles -- involve little action. They constitute awareness. The appeal to act on a situation you want to change quickly and decisively can tempt you. I advise against it, whether you are leading yourself or others. Acting without awareness can point you in counterproductive directions. It can spur you to ever more action to make up for the initial wrong direction until you finally stop and reset yourself. I call acting that way reactive. Besides wasting your time, holding you back from your potential, and…

EDIT: I modified how I present the Method slightly. Please see the new version of this page and the updated series on implementing the Method. The Method's first step was a once-per-lifetime step. Once you understand your emotional cycle once, you can retain it all your life. Step 2 begins the preparation for each situation. The main part of understanding your current emotional cycle is to understand the elements -- the relevant environments, beliefs, emotions, and behaviors. The other part is to know what you can and can't change and what you will and won't change. Your situation For the elements, I recommend writing them out. Below are three examples of the elements to situations in my life when ripe for applying the Method. Example…

[This post is part of a series on The Method to use The Model -- my model for the human emotional system designed for use in leadership, self-awareness, and general purpose professional and personal development -- which I find the most effective and valuable foundation for understanding yourself and others and improving your life. If you don't see a Table of Contents to the left, click here to view the series, where you'll get more value than reading just this post.] Today's examples of the Method are simple but effective so they illustrate the Method well as well as how to use it. The first is an effect you probably already know. Everyone knows feeling happy tends to make you smile. Most people also know…

[This post is part of a series on The Method to use The Model -- my model for the human emotional system designed for use in leadership, self-awareness, and general purpose professional and personal development -- which I find the most effective and valuable foundation for understanding yourself and others and improving your life. If you don't see a Table of Contents to the left, click here to view the series, where you'll get more value than reading just this post.] Today's example of using the Method came a year after yesterday's. That one was my first by-the-book implementation and test of the Method, this one was my first automatic implementation. I had practiced it enough to internalize it enough I did it without thinking…

[This post is part of a series on The Method to use The Model -- my model for the human emotional system designed for use in leadership, self-awareness, and general purpose professional and personal development -- which I find the most effective and valuable foundation for understanding yourself and others and improving your life. If you don't see a Table of Contents to the left, click here to view the series, where you'll get more value than reading just this post.] This example illustrates my first by-the-book implementation of the Model and Method. I don't pretend that the change was earth-shattering or bigger than it was because the magnitude of the change was not the point. The point was that the Method produced the results…