About this episode
I’d love to tell you there was a way to be happy 24/7. But that’s just not the reality of being human. Negative emotions are a part of life and a VALUABLE part at that. I think too often we just try to avoid or ignore them, but they are going to be there regardless. And actually often the more we “fight them” over owning up to them, the more they hold us back and drag us down. I saw a great equation that was suffering = pain x resistance And the point of it was the more we resist the negative emotion over embracing it and recognizing it, the more we actually suffer. So how can you start to recognize negative emotions as a good thing? #1: Recognize they’re normal. That you’re GOING to have them no matter how freaking amazing your life is. Life is going to be full of ups and downs. And honestly, you can only truly know the good by having experienced the bad. I love the mindset even of setbacks can only happen BECAUSE there has been progress. Negative feeling and emotions are part of life and they can even be a key component to helping us move forward and be happier long-term. They can help us see when situations in our life and circumstances are off. They can help us realize a change is needed for us to truly move forward and be happier. #2: Don’t just bury the seed. (Ignoring it doesn’t make it go away) I think often we try to just ignore negative emotions and feelings. We even try to stamp them down to not have to deal with them. The thing is that doesn’t truly get rid of them. Often the more we ignore those emotions, the more they come back to bite us later. It’s like burying a seed…it’s not gone…it’s actually going to GROW INTO SOMETHING MORE. The question is, what is it going to grow into? You want to control what comes of those negative emotions. So just burying them hoping they grow into something good, or maybe don’t grow at all, is a recipe for disaster. Instead you want to tend to those seeds and groom them to grow into something positive. Face what is going on. It gives you control to shape how it impacts you in the future. #3: See them as a learning experience - Assess and learn! Negative emotions are showing us things we aren’t happy with. Things we are uncomfortable with. Situations we’d like to avoid in the future. Experiencing those negative emotions can be a powerful learning tool so we don’t repeat the things that lead to those negative feelings. Of course we don’t want to fear those negative emotions so much we don’t take risks, BUT we do always want to assess what we can learn from those situations to help yourselves avoid those negative feelings in the future…and even make them POSITIVE experience. And not only can these negative emotions help us learn to create better outcomes for ourselves in the future, but they can also teach us to better embrace situations and CHOOSE how we perceive and use them. Stuff is going to happen outside of our control. We just need to recognize we have a choice in how we perceive things. So if you’ve always taken a negative perspective, maybe it’s time to even see if you can see the situation as an opportunity over an obstacle. But don’t let negative emotions lead to simply avoidance. Assess the situation. Learn from and even recognize if it is simply the downside to another upside. Because sometimes the negatives are part of getting something new and good! The video version of this episode is live on youtube!