‘Watch your attitude’

Charis: It becomes easier to acknowledge and challenge my own biases and prejudices when confronted by a third party instead of trying to identify them myself.

“STOP pulling a sour face. Watch your attitude!” my family would say when they became the subject of my anger issues.

I knew it was never fun to be on the receiving end of someone’s fury. Although I tried to rein in my temper, I often caught myself in the act, too late to take back what I had said.

Most of my friends found it hard to believe me when I described myself as “short-tempered” and “easily irritated”. To them, I appeared to be a calm, gentle and caring friend as I would go out of my way for the benefit of others.

For example, I would stay up all night, while struggling to keep my eyes open, just to lend a friend a listening ear or a shoulder to cry on. Even so, I still felt that I should be doing more to help.

I would also travel across states just to meet up and catch up with my friends because I lived the furthest away. Even after doing that, I still felt like I was not doing enough to maintain our friendship.

When it came to my family’s needs, however, I lacked the patience and empathy I had for my friends.

I never bothered to hide my frustrations and annoyance with my family members, no matter the situation, and would get upset whenever someone called me out for being disrespectful.

I would tolerate and even laugh about my friends’ shenanigans but immediately slam the door in the face of any family conflict.

But I wasn’t always like that. During my early years, I had always avoided any conflict. Could it be that constantly being on edge turned me into a ticking time bomb?

It came so naturally that I felt wronged every time my family called me out on my faults. That was until I learned to reflect on my emotions and reactions a few years ago, and even more so now that I am studying psychology.

I began taking a step back from triggering situations to reassess my emotions and biases before letting them take control of my reactions.

Keeping a journal is one of the methods that has been of great help in the process of my self-growth.

By putting a scenario in black and white and consciously recalling what went through my mind during the experience, it helps me to look at the situation from a different perspective.

In the face of a potentially triggering situation, I try to find the core of the problem instead of just looking at it from the surface level.

It also helps to get the opinions of trusted people, such as close friends and family members. Whenever I am stuck in a loop of disruptive thoughts, I will ask for second opinions that are constructive in breaking the loop and gaining new points of view.

It becomes easier to acknowledge and challenge my own biases and prejudices when confronted by a third party instead of trying to identify them myself.

While I have made noticeable improvements, it is still an ongoing journey of regulating my emotions and learning the appropriate behaviours in certain situations.

I am still taking the initiative to discover other ways of overcoming my impulsive emotions. It seems like a long way to go but I believe my efforts are necessary as no one deserves to be the target of any negativity.

Charis, 20, a student in Kuala Lumpur, is a participant of the BRATs Young Journalist Programme run by The Star’s Newspaper-in-Education (Star-NiE) team. To join Star-NiE’s online youth community, go to facebook.com/niebrats.