One of the consequences of living life is experiencing emotions of all kinds. Happiness, sadness, anger, jealousy. There is virtually no limit to the array of emotions a person can feel through their human experience. Negative emotions are inevitable. Even if you think of yourself as a really positive person, you’ll feel disappointed or overwhelmed at some point in your life. So, how do you live with these kinds of emotions? Here are a few ideas.
Stop ruminating. People are great at reinjuring themselves by playing the details of a negative event over and over again in their minds. When you do this, you tend to blow a situation out of proportion—meaning yes, the situation is bad, but your recollection of it focuses on certain aspects that twists the knife. For example, maybe you recently lost a pet in a tragic way which inevitably brings sadness, but you ruminate over the last few minutes you spent with the animal rather than the many good years you had together. This is one way we allow negative emotions to take over.
There’s a time for everything. Again, if you are living and breathing, you’ll experience something negative which brings the same resulting emotions in you at some point in your life. The key here is to be reasonable. If you have a simple acceptance that life will not always bring happiness, you’ll have a better sense of coping with the negatives. Bad feelings come and go, and during this time, it’s helpful to try to think of things that will make you feel better. This will give you some sense of control.
Get your mind off of it. Sometimes, one of the best ways to live with a negative emotion is to distract yourself. Make a list of hobbies or activities you really like to do that makes you feel better. Do puppy videos make you smile? How about reading a book? Spending time with your best friend? Visiting a museum? Distracting yourself can go a long way to living with anything negative that is going on in your life. As soon as something gets too heavy, turn to one of these things to redirect your attention. You’ll still feel the negativity but in a much lesser sense.
Move your body. Did you know that getting some exercise will lower the stress chemicals your body creates? That’s why taking a walk or going to the gym can sometimes make you feel better by itself. Moving your body in this way helps you process your negative emotions. Try this strategy on a regular basis to help regulate your emotions and live with the negative experiences that come your way.
The past is the past. Ultimately, you can’t change what’s happened. And in this sense, the past is truly in the past. When you live in how things used to be or get stuck on one negative thing that happened, you aren’t able to live in the present. This automatically makes your negative emotions worse as it steals you of mindfulness and enjoying what’s going on in the moment. Learning from your mistakes also helps you reframe your negative emotions.
