How To Become Emotionless (17 Ways To Become Emotionless)

Being in any relationship means you’ll be leaving your heart open to feel emotions. Emotions range from positive ones such as happiness and fulfillment to negative ones like sadness and anger. It is completely normal to feel emotions. 

However, when not managed properly, emotional outbursts can complicate things. If you are in a romantic relationship, it is usually hard to separate your feelings from your thoughts and actions. Hence, you’re bound to go on an emotional roller coaster at several points. 

Emotions indicate how you feel, thereby allowing you to process your thoughts before you react. However, the ability to control your emotions will save you from making certain mistakes. Even in friendships, friends need to filter their negative thoughts to protect the other person from a raw display of strong emotions. 

The new generation culture of speaking your mind at all costs has its place. However, many lives and integrity have been destroyed because people lack the understanding that being expressive is different from oversharing.

Are you an overly emotional person whose mind is like a sponge, soaking in every sad word or negative expression? Are you an emotional chameleon who takes on whatever emotions its environment currently has? If yes, you need to act emotionless sometimes, so that other people will stop yanking at your emotions anytime they want.

To stop feeling emotional and acting irrational, consider the following tips to become emotionless.

17 Ways To Become Emotionless 

1. What brought on the emotion?

One of the ways to deal with your emotional outbursts is to first place the cause of the emotion. What makes you feel angry? Who makes you feel hurt easily? What is the root of your worry? Knowing where each emotion stems from will give an inkling of how to manage or stop it. 

If you cannot indicate what makes you feel weak, you wouldn’t know how to counteract that feeling. If your partner is responsible for your negative feelings, you’ll be able to talk to them. They care about you, so they will want to inspire only beautiful feelings in you. If you need to cut off the factor influencing your ill feelings, you’ll still need to know what it is first. 

2. Breathe deeply to calm yourself down

When experiencing a panic attack, physicians and first responders advise that you take long deep breaths through your nose, then let them out slowly through your mouth. This procedure, when repeated, will help slow down your racing heart and calm your nervous system.

Similarly, apart from panic attacks, breathing in deeply and exhaling slowly will help you in that moment of anger. When you start feeling the rage burning through you, and you just want to smash someone’s face to bits, slow breaths will lessen your volcanic energy. Also, if you’re usually given to crying jags at the drop of a hat, practicing slow deep breaths can help.

3. Do a self-image check

Sometimes, reminding yourself of who you are is enough to make you act emotionless. Emotionless people are unruffled like a rock. Like a precious stone, they don’t need to crack to display their elegance. However, emotional people are quick to ruffle themselves and others because they are like unstable waves.

When you look at your reflection in the mirror in your moment of pain, fear, anger, or undue excitement, you remind yourself who the master of your life is. You’re reminded of your core being, values, and beliefs, which you don’t want to compromise for anyone. By letting your focus be on your body features, you’ll feel present while your recent conflict fades away. 

4. Do a quick exercise

Apart from doing a quick breathing exercise, you can engage in a short intensity workout to release tension. Try some easy yoga poses or advanced ones, depending on your level of expertise. A quick sprint down and up your stairs or street would help too.

You may also try jumping ropes for a few minutes. When your heart is pumping for a different reason, you will attain an emotionless state for that moment. You may want to try other mind-based exercises instead because you won’t always be in a place where you can do a quick physical exercise. 

5. Walk away

The first thing most people tell you to do in a heated situation is to walk away. The reason why this advice is best in most situations is that you’ll be avoiding back-and-forth reactions that could escalate. The moment you walk away from your conflict, you won’t be sparring with them, physically or orally.

If the person is someone you have to live with or see after that moment, it would be wise to walk away. Otherwise, both of you would say things you don’t mean and cannot take back. Being emotionless is not always an indication that your partner doesn’t care. It just means they are trying to preserve the good thing you share.

6. Channel your negative thoughts towards something productive

Another way to show your emotionless self in a needed situation is by redirecting your feelings. For instance, if your child is old enough to drive and has been doing so for years, you have no reason to worry. However, if your fear stems from a past car accident experience, it’s easy to understand why you worry.

However, fear will not keep your child safe. As such, it is best if you channel your feelings towards productive things. Think of things you like to do that calms you. It could be painting, baking, repairing things, or even mental calculations. This exercise will put your mind at rest, albeit temporarily until your child’s next drive.

7. Find a train station and scream

Borrow a page from the women of The Bold Type and go to the nearest train station. The best way to deal with emotional pain is not always to turn cold. Highly emotional people can attain an emotionless state after they’ve released the tension and knot in their chest. 

If there is no train station close by, try to scream into your pillow. It won’t be as effective as screaming your lungs out at a train station, but it will help. If you have access to an empty beach or clifftop, let loose your frustration and pent-up emotions till you’re empty. 

8. Stay away from your triggers

It is one thing to immediately walk away from an ongoing situation, it is another thing to avoid making the situation repeat itself. One of the ways to do this is by avoiding triggers that might lead to more conflicts. 

If your trigger is a place, find another location and ensure your acquaintances don’t invite you to such places. If it is a person, avoid them like the plague. When people bring out the worst in you, they take a piece of you with them. Becoming emotionless can only be achieved by staying away from such persons.

9. Learn to accept the importance of emotions

One mistake that we make is to think not feeling anything is good. There is a difference between being numb and being emotionless. When you’re numb, you don’t feel anything. On the other hand, being emotionless means only you decide when your emotions come out to play. You are in total control of your thoughts, feelings, and actions.

As such, denying your feelings will only cause your mind to shove back until you react negatively. Accept that it is good to feel because only someone with feelings can control their emotions.

10. Confront your emotions

You hear people say, “face your demons and fight them”. Demons here obviously don’t mean flying gnomes or hobbits. They refer to the negative thoughts which push you to act out of character. Some emotions are so destructive that you feel like another being is taking over your body and wreaking havoc in your place.

Pretending you don’t have these demons will only torment you further. Confront your feelings by sorting them separately. Then, proffer solutions to make good use of them. You’d be surprised at the productive things your confrontation will yield.

11. Channel your inner cold as an ice personality

Everyone tends to have a mean streak, and so, acting like the big bad wolf or cold princess sometimes will help you look emotionless. Whoever is wanting to ruffle your feathers will soon realize you are not interested in their brand of trouble.

You don’t have to be cold-hearted to act cold. Yes, you’re putting up a façade, but it is for your protection and maybe theirs. For instance, if you discover that your partner is cheating, you might be tempted to bathe them in acid. However, making yourself emotionless will save you from jail time and self-loathing. 

12. Prioritize your well-being

Except if you are a therapist, pastor, or counselor, your job is not to attend to other people’s problems to the detriment of your well-being. Even these professionals keep a working time and they don’t take their clients’ problems home with them. If you’re a good listener or natural counselor, do your best but also tend to yourself. 

Prioritizing yourself means you have fewer encounters with dramas that can make you show emotions unnecessarily. If you’re drinking water and minding your business, your well-being will improve. 

13. Mindfulness therapy helps too

Mindfulness is similar to breath control but helps you to focus on more than your breath. By taking a simple yoga pose or simply closing your eyes, then travel to your mind. You focus on your breath, the feeling in your limbs, fingers, or toes. 

Take note of the way your eyelids twitch or the way your pulse beats. These basic and seemingly ridiculous exercises will bring your consciousness to the present and how your body works. You’ll be in a state of awareness, yet emotionless towards external forces. 

14. Check your emotions through journaling

Writing down your thoughts and feelings is another way to let off steam without doing irreparable damage. When disagreements happen within valuable relationships, immediate reactions usually cause ripple effects. However, when you direct your negative feelings to your journal, you can maim, slap, beat or do much harm to your contact of conflict without physical contact. 

More often than not, we don’t mean the things we say or do, but we regret them after they are done. Avoid getting emotional in the face of your aggressor. Then write your true feelings in your journal. Moreover, you can tear up the journal if you regret your words.

15. Manage stress factors properly

Stress is a huge contributor to uncontrolled emotions and outbursts. Unfortunately, stress is a part of daily living that is best managed. Thinking you can eliminate stress is ignorant thinking. However, you can manage it properly.

Practice time management so you’re not overwhelmed by tasks, leading to poor handling of situations. Practice financial management by sorting your bills on time and not spending above budget.

Eat properly so that your body will cooperate with your mind and reduce mental stress. Women eating junk are more likely to experience hormonal imbalances than women who eat healthily. Men who eat well tend to also think properly. Self-care is vital if you want to control your emotions and actions.

16. Prioritize adequate rest

Rest is another thing you should prioritize because it helps you shut down and recalibrate. Rest comes in form of sleeping, napping, or just not doing anything. When you sleep, you’re not thinking, and not thinking means you’ll feel emotionless.

When you get adequate rest every day, you’ll be less likely to engage in unnecessary outbursts. Many people underestimate the power of rest because they think they have time. However, not getting sufficient rest can leave you disoriented most of the time. This can in turn hurt you and your loved ones.

17. Don’t rely on avoidance tactics

Avoidance tactics differ from intentional distractions. Relying on alcohol and hard drugs will only give you an illusion that the problem has gone away. The moment the haze clears, your emotion goes haywire again. It is very easy to turn to recreational drugs, but they can become addictive easily.

Yes, you will be emotionless, but for how long? The risks outweigh the benefits, which is why it is best to adopt better options. You may also see a therapist who can walk you through the different ways to stop emotional outbursts. 

FAQs

In Conclusion

It is hard to be suddenly emotionless, especially if you’ve been caring all your life. However, trying these tips will help you manage your feelings and save you a world of pain. 

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