How To Manage When You Feel Irritable

Join Clare for an exploration of how to manage when you are feeling irritable which provides an opportunity to learn a simple understanding of how your mind works which help to develop self-awareness.

Leave your busy intellectual mind behind and listen to this track like you would listen to music, in the background. Remember that you can listen to this track again and again to deepen your access to calm, balance, and clarity in your life and business.

Transcript

Hello and welcome to the CalmCast,

A time to feel calm and think clearly.

I'm Clare Downam,

The Queen of Calm,

A Transformational Life Coach.

I was a burnt out head teacher who finally made the journey to calm after years of trying,

And I want to prevent you from having to do the same.

The CalmCast is a series of short explorations gently guiding you back to your natural state,

Which is calm and clarity.

Just listen like you would listen to music,

With an open mind and curiosity.

There's nothing else to do.

Now let's relax into today's episode.

So today,

I think this is a really good one.

It's a good one for me.

It may be a good one for you.

Today is the day after a four day weekend,

And it's how to manage when you feel irritable.

So I am feeling a little bit,

I'm laughing,

But I woke up this morning feeling a little bit irritable.

I did have a couple of boozy drinks yesterday,

So that's probably why.

And I used to think,

Like,

If I woke up feeling that way,

That there was something to do about that,

I must not feel irritable.

Especially now that I'm the Queen of Calm,

Goodness gracious,

No feeling irritable can't be right.

And I am laughing because,

I mean,

I remember once having a client who came to see me and he said,

And his main problem,

The reason he'd come to see me was that he was waking up,

Excuse me,

And tired and irritable,

And tired and irritable,

That he was waking up feeling grumpy.

And he thought that was a problem.

And I remember just saying to him,

It's really human to feel grumpy sometimes.

And this young man's face just fell,

Like in a good way,

Like in a shocked,

Surprised,

But pleasantly,

Pleasantly surprised kind of way.

And he said to me,

What do you mean?

It's okay to be grumpy.

So it's okay to be irritable too,

Of course.

I'm not sure what the real difference is between irritable and grumpy.

Perhaps irritable looks like other people.

And I said,

Yes,

It's absolutely fine to wake up feeling grumpy.

So it's okay then.

He just kept saying,

Kept stopping and saying,

Are you sure it's okay?

Yep,

It's fine.

You don't have to feel any particular way.

You're a human being.

You're supposed to have these fluctuations in how you're feeling.

And he was just blown away.

You could see that he kind of,

I taught him a little bit more about this thing that I share,

The three principles,

The inside out understanding.

I guided him a little bit more with that.

But really just me saying it's okay to be grumpy was massive.

And so that's it for this morning,

Really.

It's going to be a very short broadcast.

No,

I'll waffle on a bit longer.

It's okay to feel irritable.

Now I'm not saying don't do anything about it.

Like if you know that going for a nice walk in the sunshine tends to lift your mood and you quite like to have a better mood,

Then it's fine.

You can do that if you want to.

But,

But maybe not from the place of beating yourself up.

Like it's okay to feel a little bit,

And a bit irritable.

I mean,

It's a joke in this house now.

I'm a menopausal woman.

I do go up and down frequently,

Especially when I'm tired,

Like I am today.

And a little,

I'm not hung over,

But a little bit.

Alcohol does that,

Doesn't it?

It gives you this kind of edginess quite often.

And sometimes I just warn him,

My other half,

Bruce,

And just kind of say,

Just need to let you know that I'm going to be a bit off it today.

I'm going to be a bit moody and I'm a bit irritable.

And I can feel it right now as I'm talking about it.

It's like a little funny feeling around my shoulders.

This just kind of irritable feeling.

So I know to take care of myself today.

I know not to make any silly decisions,

Like big decisions or,

You know,

Like sometimes when I feel like this,

I'm like,

I'm throwing it all in.

I'm going to get a job.

Being in a business is awful.

I hate it.

I'm going to,

I'm going to,

I'm going to go get a job or I'm going to sell up and leave the country.

That's another one that,

That might actually happen.

But,

You know,

It's all,

It's all like,

Irrational,

Irrational thinking.

So when I entitled this,

How to Manage When You Feel Irritable,

I don't really want you to be inclined to manage anything.

So let's,

The question is slightly different than,

Isn't it?

Like,

I'm not saying you need to do anything,

But there is something helpful to be seen about feeling irritable.

And the first thing is that it is okay.

Like when I call myself the Queen of Calm,

When I talk about calm,

I'm not saying that I am like a duck pond the whole time,

Not at all.

But what I am saying is that it's okay not to be like a duck pond.

That's okay.

That's normal.

That's human.

You're not a machine.

You are like the seasons.

You have different phases,

Different ways of feeling,

Different ways of being,

And they're all okay.

You don't have to do anything about any of your feeling states.

Now,

When I say you don't have to do anything,

As I say,

It doesn't mean you might not choose to do something.

What you can not do,

But what is helpful to know is that if you're feeling irritable,

You're not probably in your best state of mind.

Your thinking is probably not going to be your best.

It's not going to be the best time to make decisions.

Like this is not me telling you not to make a decision,

But this is me saying to you,

Once you're aware,

And this is about awareness raising,

It's just becoming more aware of how we're doing in the moment.

And just in the moment,

You're not an irritable person.

Sometimes I think I am a bit more.

Some days I am.

You're not an irritable person.

That's not what's true of you all the time,

But you sometimes will feel irritable.

That is normal.

Sometimes you'll feel happy.

Sometimes you'll feel sad.

Sometimes you'll be grumpy.

Sometimes you'll feel tired.

Goodness gracious,

This is a tired one this morning,

Isn't it?

And it's okay to feel tired.

Absolutely fine.

Not a problem.

Human,

Completely human.

You are supposed to have these different human experiences.

Can you imagine what life would be like if you were happy all the time?

Well,

First of all,

You wouldn't know you were happy.

That's interesting,

Isn't it?

Like if you were happy all the time,

You wouldn't know you were because you wouldn't have anything to compare it with.

And so then it would just be this,

It would be just a nothing really.

It wouldn't be an experience.

That's interesting to consider,

Isn't it?

Those of us who are vying to be happy all the time or calm all the time or anything all the time.

I mean,

In a way,

Like I think in the past,

If somebody had said to me,

That's not possible,

I would have been gutted.

You mean I can't meditate my way to be calm all the time?

What the heck?

I'm really annoyed about that.

But now I'm like,

Oh,

So it's just okay to be irritable.

It's okay to be grumpy.

It's okay not to be calm.

There's nothing for me to do about that.

And that feels like a whole way off rather than what it felt like before,

Which was devastating.

Devastating.

I mean,

I can't make myself be a certain way all the time.

And it's easy to see why we've got caught in this trap of thinking that we can.

Because you look out there at how to be calm.

I imagine that would produce a good hundred,

Several hundred million results,

Maybe a billion.

Seems it goes up every time I look,

Every time I ask one of these questions.

You could literally spend the rest of your life trying to be calm,

Happy,

Content,

Whatever the thing is that you would like to feel.

You could do that all day long,

Every day,

All day,

Every day.

Just keep trying to be calm.

And in fact,

One of the lovely teachers in my community,

Dickon Bettinger,

Who's absolutely grounded in this understanding now,

Used to meditate for four hours a day.

Four hours a day.

That's a lot of time doing nothing else.

Isn't it?

And I'm not saying don't meditate.

I'm not saying don't meditate.

Enjoy meditation if you enjoy meditation.

But if you're doing it to try and get somewhere,

That might not be the best idea.

Because,

Well,

Because it's just a lot to do to me when it's okay to be irritable and it's okay to,

You know,

To not be calm,

Happy,

Content all the time.

Now,

I mean,

There is still with this,

With this awareness,

Though,

There are still things that I do.

So I do,

As I say,

I warn Bruce,

I say to Bruce,

I've got to bed the wrong side today.

I'm going to be really critical because usually when I'm irritable,

I'm critical.

They come together for me.

Anybody else have that same issue?

You're irritable,

You tend to be really noticing what everybody else is doing wrong a lot.

So I might warn him.

I might take it easy today.

I might not.

I might say if there's meetings I don't have to do,

I won't do them.

You know,

I'll drink plenty of water,

I'll look after myself.

And that's it,

Really.

It's not about trying to change yourself,

But it probably makes sense to look after yourself.

That might mean that you choose to sit in a chair and meditate.

Lovely.

If that's what you like to do and you find that helpful.

But how to,

I mean,

The idea that we have to manage every single flipping feeling that is not perfect,

Whatever that is,

All feelings are perfect to me now.

But that idea that we have to try to manage all that is just tiring,

Isn't it?

It's a lot to do.

And I don't know about you,

But I've got better things to do with my time.

So it turns out we can go through the day with irritable on board and just like,

Oh,

Okay,

I see you.

I acknowledge that there's a bit of irritability there.

I'm aware of it.

So I can just be aware of myself a bit more maybe and how I'm doing,

But I don't have to get rid of it.

You manage when you're feeling irritable.

You just have a nicer experience of life when you're feeling irritable,

When you know it's okay to feel irritable.

That's huge.

I think that's huge for everybody.

So hopefully you're not feeling too irritable today,

But if you are,

That's okay.

That's okay.

Take care of yourself.

Show yourself some compassion because that's key to,

Key to realise that it's okay to be irritable and that everybody,

I mean everybody,

Even the cross-legged Buddhist monk who appears to experience no particular,

Everybody experiences this.

Everybody does.

Isn't that amazing to see?

We're all human.

We're all having this human experience.

Let's do it with some self-compassion and be nice to ourselves.

So I hope you found that helpful.

I hope you're not feeling irritable,

But please do let me know if you are.

And if you would like to experience more about this,

You know where to find me.

Lots of love.

Take care.

Thank you so much for listening.

There's nothing to do now,

But bring some awareness to how this is working out in your life.

Listen regularly to experience longer and longer periods of calm.

This has been The Calm Cast with Claire Downer,

Queen of Calm.

Take care and keep listening.

Reviews

I actually found this talk to be relieving (I felt the shift in my body as I listened also might I add), and even your yawning during it made me smile lol…it’s all so humane and normalizing/validating/accepting, which appears to be the intention…

Thank you for sharing your light…May you continue to take good care of yourself as well 💗🙏🏾

Clare, you talk so much sense!

It’s about accepting me in this present moment, and continuing to accept me in the next moment. Rinse and repeat 🤣😊😊.

Metta and blessings 🙏🙏

Thank you! Sometimes I am like aaaaarrrgggghhh. The irritability overwhelms. Your meditation guided me, helped me. Thank you. I needed to hear that!

soothing voice and practical advice. Will listen to other episodes