The funny side of emotion regulating neural circuits ...

goldin_08.pdf
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This paper provides a scientific view of emotional control / regulation and the benefits of having the capacity to control our emotional responses in everyday life. 

We have to thank Jack and his parents for providing this 'enjoyable' insight into the inner-self. Once you've stopped laughing at this poor guy recovering from the anesthetic used for his wisdom teeth operation, you might want to take a second to ponder the following thought ... we all have these emotions, at significant intensities and volumes swinging from positive to negative somewhere in our heads on a minute by minute, daily basis.

These emotions can just as easily call on our deepest memories from childhood with no more effort than recalling the events of yesterday. As we see here, Jack is just as happy associating to Goldilocks as he is to the best friend he was with the previous night. (Who he thinks is a wonderful friend by the way!).

The important thing to recognise in business, is that everyone of us is pulled by such ferocious emotions, swinging from 'positive' to 'negative' in the blink of an eye, as we (our brains) assess different situations and reconcile each against previous experience, decising if people or principles are 'Good' or 'Bad'. 

It is only our learned regulation circuits which keep us from exposing our inner-most feelings in the same way Jack does here, while his neural circuits are temporarily inhibited by anesthetic. The down-side to having this capacity to regulate, is that it cost's precious neural glucose energy to so.

When we at Dux talk about 'Creating prevailing conditions in which people can perform at their best', we consider these deeper issues, we remain aware of the challenges the trials and tribulations of organisational life present at a sub-conscious level. We help leadership teams create conditions in which this hidden world is made easier, allowing more neural glucose energy to be made available for higher level functions, leading to higher conscious performance in our client corporations.