It is perfectly normal to experience times of sadness, worry, or stress. You can bet that most of us will do so, many times throughout our lives. If accepting this, can help guide our emotional experience towards a more positive one, what can we do to improve our odds of success so we can feel happiness again?
Correcting a label
Emotional experiences that are unpleasant in the moment and which may increase overall unhappiness, such as sadness, worry, and stress, tend to get labelled as bad or negative. The problem I see with this is that in our constant pursuit of happiness we may avoid and discard these "bad" emotional experiences as having no purpose other than delaying our arrival at the destination we seek. However, if you believe that personal growth is achieved by overcoming obstacles, then how can we call these as being "negative". Would these experiences not fit better if labelled as "Difficult" instead?
And if you are like a miner, always looking for the silver lining, could you go as far as to accept that sadness, worry, and stress may at times become positive emotional experiences?
The positive emotional experience.
We typically associate positive emotional experiences as being related to joy, amusement, inspiration, love, or many more that are pleasant in the moment and cause our overall happiness to increase . I would tend to agree, but I also choose to widen that spectrum to include Difficult Emotional Experiences, but which resulted in gaining a better understanding of self, or that assisted in the discovery of improved coping tools and prevention mechanisms.
"What doesn't kill you makes you stronger"
Part 1 - Your general outlook.
You have many tools available to help improve your emotional experiences. This first batch of tools are more on the psychological side and have to do with the outlook you take moving forward.
Toolkit Item #1 - You are responsible for your happiness.
The primary question that lead you here, "What can you do?", is also the first item in our toolkit. It is the acceptance that ultimately you are responsible for your own happiness. You may need help in dealing with some difficult emotional experiences, you don't have to be alone. You can ask for help, you can make the choice to learn, to use the tools you discover, and how destructive or productive you let these experiences become. It always ends with, what you do.
"You can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink"
Toolkit Item #2 - Introspection is a good thing.
Introspecting is when you take the time to observe or review your mental and emotional process. Typically performed sometime after the initial emotional event has passed, it is the most important tool you have. This is the time to learn and it helps to ask yourself questions such as.
Why did you experience this difficult event?
How did you responded during the event, and shortly after?
Was your response detrimental to your happiness, why?
How can you decrease the negative impacts of such an event in the future?
Toolkit Item #3 - Accepting the past.
Sadness and its cousin emotions are based on events in the past. All though you may feel sad in the present, the reason for this emotion has come and gone. You cannot change what happened, but you can change how long you let it affect you. This is not to say that one should block out the past and never revisit it. Accept the past so you may learn from it and realizing you cannot change it move on.
I am not assuming that accepting the past is going to be easy. Certain experiences, such as the death of a loved one, or a bad break up may linger for a long time. Seek out some help if need be, but generally speaking once you accept the past, life becomes a little bit easier.
Toolkit Item #4 - Embracing the future.
Worry, along with anxiety, reside with events of the future. That is to say, we worry and get anxious about what will happen later. Some describe this as the stories we tell ourselves about what we may believe will happen. If we believe there are possibilities of failure, we may worry. If we are uncertain of what will happen, we could get anxious.
Planning and thinking of the future in its self is not a bad thing. If we did not do so, we would be limiting our abilities to achieve what we desire. Since we cannot control how others will react or what other factors may destroy our best laid plans, we are left with one logical option. Plan it out and put our best foot forward.
Further to our detriment is when we worry so much that we over analyze the potential scenarios, and never get anything done. If we don't act, we achieve nothing.
"Paralysis through analysis"
Toolkit Item #5 - De clutter the present.
The present is where stress resides. All those tasks, the unreasonable expectations, the emergencies, the deadlines. When there is not enough time, and too much to be done we stress. In these moments we hurt ourselves, we half fast assignments, we drop things completely and miss delivering on promises.
Stress may not be present in your everyday life. It may arrive when a few areas of your life bubble over with expectations. In these situations it may be good to de clutter some of your expectations. You may not always be able to get everything done, do you really have to make all those appointments, are some meetings really necessary. The more we de clutter the things that don't serve our goals in the present, the more energy we have for those moments where pressure is high.
Part 2 - The now.
It's all good to talk about the conscious choices you can make after the emotional experiences. Sometimes to prevent damage to your happiness, you need more immediate solution. This next group of tools have to do more with the biological and the prevention side of things.
Toolkit Item #6 - Supplements.
Some supplements, such as MoodLift, may help increase the production and reception of the various "feel good" hormones in your brain. As they are supplements they do not need physician referrals and prescriptions. Moodlift may not be strong enough for you if you are suffering from depression, but it does give you a helping hand during periods of elevated stress, sadness, or worry.
Toolkit Item #7 - Proper rest.
Outside of your own attitude and outlook, sleep is a major benefit to having the energy you need to help get you through difficult emotional experiences. Sleep is also a good time for your body to replenish the depleting reserves of "feel good" hormones.
Toolkit Item #8 - Exercise.
When you exercise your body releases chemicals called endorphins. Good for pain reduction, endorphins also trigger a positive feeling in the body. Secondly, regular exercise improves your physical health, which goes a long way in making you feel better about yourself. This elevation of self, helps reduce difficult emotional experiences.
Toolkit Item #9 - Proper nutrition.
Your body and mind need proper nutrition. When you are fed the right vitamins and minerals you can balance the chemicals in your body better. The more balanced your body is, the less stress it feels and the better your mind copes with difficult emotions.
Toolkit Item #10 - Social events.
We naturally have a need to belong. While we all need different levels of social activity, we all need some. Time with friends goes a long way to releasing stress, sadness or worry. Join a club, go more places and meet new people. Sharing in the experiences you all go through helps you get a wider perspective on life, providing you with preventative tools for the future.
Toolkit Item #11 - Time off and away.
Make sure to take time for yourself, away from the regular routine. That constant pull on your energy depletes your tank, give yourself some time to be disconnected from it all. Replenishing your batteries will make it easier to deal with the difficulties of life. This can be as easy as an hour in your garden.
Toolkit Item #12 - Enjoy more relaxing hobbies.
Hobbies like gardening, get you doing something that can make you feel better about yourself. They also help you release stress and provide a good time for some introspecting.
Conclusion
We all live with stress, sadness, worry but these emotional events can turn into a positive experience.