I look everywhere. The emails aren’t there. Not in junk either. My heart starts pumping faster, my breathing quickens, my jaw starts clenching. The smile I woke up with vanishes from my face.

Every morning, I check if these daily reflections were sent and delivered properly. I use two personal emails to track that. This day in particular, none of the Daily Yogi emails were delivered to my personal inboxes.

Countless angry thoughts started flooding my mind, “What? Why? How many other subscribers didn’t receive it? What is wrong with this platform? I am promising one email every weekday, without failure. Imagine people sign up and they don’t receive them consistently. What would they think about the newsletter? They would think it is unreliable. That I didn’t deliver on my promise of daily reflections. I am going to lose them.”

Now the anger started clouding my judgment. “Stop.” I ordered my mind. “Breathe. Observe the anger and let it just fly by, like a cloud in the sky. Reach out to technical support and let them know what happened. There’s nothing else you can do.”

I have fairly good control of my mind. Thanks to studying and practicing the Yogi philosophy daily. Thanks to understanding that I am not my mind, that it is a tool I use. But I am far from immune to impulses of anger and frustration. So here I was, getting caught up by these emotions.

And this might happen to you. You work so hard for something, only to have someone else mess it up. You have been planning that event for so long, only to have unexpected things happen and ruin your plans. You pay a lot of money to renovate your home quickly, and the contractor keeps making mistakes and delaying the project.

All this incites feelings of anger, of frustration. Your instincts, your animal nature come rushing forward to cloud your judgment. They beg you to get triggered. They seek an outlet.

After the rush of emotions and doing my part inquiring about the issue, I just closed my eyes, concentrated on my breath and slowed it down. The emotion was so strong that I decided to meditate for a few minutes. The thoughts and emotions kept coming, but with each passing minute, they became weaker and weaker. I gradually entered a peaceful state of mind.

Next time you face frustrating situations, remember that you are not your mind. Take a deep breath, observe the anger, and let it pass. Focus on finding solutions rather than dwelling on the problem. Don’t let anger cloud your judgment.

Your mind is just a tool for your expression. Use it. Don’t let it use you. Don’t let it rob you of being present. Don’t let it change your positive mood.

Stay present, stay calm, and stay in control.

Note: I apologize if you have been missing some emails this past week; it has been out of my control. There are technical updates being made by my email provider. I’ve never failed to send them every weekday. I am counting on them fixing the issues to prevent this from happening in the future, otherwise I’ll get angry… nah just kidding. Breathe, just breathe. Slowly. Everything will be alright.