Q: I am a 50 years old man having anxiety and stress. I developed symptoms 3 years back when I was denied a promotion, which I deserved. I started becoming very emotional and sensitive and whenever I heard some news or viewed some scenes on the TV, I would become emotional and tears would roll down my cheeks. Though later I would wonder as to why I was crying without any apparent cause. I was taking Feliz S-10. After a year, my symptoms vanished and the doctor started tapering off the dose and now I have completely stopped taking medicines since a month. Now, again since a few days, I have developed symptoms of excessive thinking, tears in the eyes without apparent cause, worrying over trivial issues and so on. My internist asked me to start Feliz S - 10 and he told me to increase it to Feliz S – 20, which he said will completely cure me. Why is this happening again? Please advise.

A:The key lies in the phrase used by yourself: "I did not get the promotion though I deserved the most". It raises the issue of perception, emotions, and thoughts and beliefs related to the promotion. There is the strong possibility that your emotionality without apparent cause after hearing some news or watching something on the TV, could be related to the linkages you are tending to form subconsciously in what you experienced and what you are witnessing. You are seemingly personalising the distress, shame, frustration that you may have gone through when you could not go up the ladder professionally. For individuals success in one field can sometimes be generalised for their self esteem to be equivalent to success in all fields and in life per se. However, success is such a relative term for certain others and may or may not be related to personal happiness and satisfaction. There is a saying that happiness is a state of mind, a state of mind meaning that it is not affected too much by external events or external circumstances. There are certain things beyond our control, and we need to practice to keep our mind and our emotions in control. Though difficult, it is worth making an attempt in increasing our emotional intelligence. Incidentally there is this book by Daniel Goleman, which may be worth a read but more than that worth practice consistently and continuously. I would also recommend you to meet a clinical psychologist for undergoing counseling and it would indeed be useful to go over and over gain with the psychologist about the events, feelings and emotions, thoughts, behaviour, personal perception, etc. around the inability to gain promotion.