Coaching practices for Emotion Fits the Facts

Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Emotion Fits the Facts, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.

Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?

• One person’s story will wreck me and pull all my attention and giving toward them, while a number standing for thousands of people in the same situation leaves me feeling almost nothing
• Someone read my message and didn’t reply, and now I’m spun up and certain they’re angry at me
• On paper this is the obviously rational call, but there’s a gut unease about it nobody will say out loud because we can’t justify it logically
• The feeling that I’m about to be exposed is so strong it just registers as fact
• Okay, I’ve sorted out whether the feeling fits

Practices that may help

1. Correct for “identified victim” over-weighting
   Recognizing that vivid individual stories feel more compelling than identical statistics helps you allocate attention and resources more rationally.
   The Affect Heuristic — When Feelings Substitute for Facts
2. Check the facts
   Before acting on an emotion, ask whether your interpretation of the situation actually fits the evidence.
   DBT Emotion Regulation Skills, Made Practical
3. Red hat: name the emotions without justifying them
   Give feelings a legitimate place in the discussion — the red hat makes emotional data explicit so it stops running covertly.
   Six Thinking Hats, Made Practical
4. Separate feelings from facts
   Treat "I feel incompetent" as a feeling to examine, not a fact to act on.
   Overcoming Imposter Syndrome, Made Practical
5. Decide on a regulation strategy based on what the facts actually show
   Use the outcome of checking the facts to choose the right next step — not the same step every time.
   Check the Facts, Made Practical
6. Check the facts first
   Decide whether the emotion actually fits the situation before doing anything about it.
   Opposite Action: Acting Against the Emotion’s Urge
7. Name the emotion and what triggered it
   Start by identifying the emotion specifically and the event that preceded it — without mixing interpretation in.
   Check the Facts, Made Practical
8. Emotional reasoning
   Treat a feeling as direct evidence about external reality: "I feel like a fraud, so I must be one."
   Cognitive Distortions: The Thinking Errors Behind Anxiety and Depression
9. Observe the emotion without feeding it
   When a strong emotion hits, watch it without adding the story that keeps it going.
   The 90-Second Rule, Made Practical
10. Name the primary emotion, not the secondary one
    Anger is almost always a secondary emotion — name what’s underneath it.
    I-Statements: How to Express Yourself Without Triggering Defensiveness

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