We often feel unhappy for small and insignificant reasons.

Someone cuts us off on the motorway, or a car swoops in and takes our parking spot before our very eyes, it’s raining, or a house mate has had the last of our ice cream. 

Stuff like these can easily get us out of control, can’t they?

Nevertheless, let’s just point out, that our unhappiness is not capable of bringing the ice cream back, and it can’t stop the rain either.

Therefore, unhappiness is totally pointless.

Yet, we get completely engrossed in it. We tell our friends and family about it and expect compassion and sympathy.

But what we actually get is – more unhappiness.

You see, this is how it works:

You have a negative emotion -> you think about it, what caused it and how it made you feel, you tell the people around you about it -> thoughts and discussions about it only feed the negative emotion you are already experiencing and intensify it -> which on the other hand leads to more unhappiness.

It’s a vicious cycle, really. 

Can you think of the last time you found yourself in a similar situation? I’m sure you can. We all can.

So what’s the proper way of dealing with a negative emotion? 

Well, it’s simple. Not easy, but simple.

All you need to do, is break the cycle. Instead of playing it over and over again in your head and tell everyone you know about it, just accept it.

Let’s go back to the situation with the parking spot. Instead of getting angry at the other person, just say to yourself:

“Well, somebody else took that parking spot. I got a little agitated, but that’s okay.”

Take a deep breath, and acknowledge your frustration, without feeding it. – ” I’m a little angry, but that’s okay. “

You can even try this with a smile on your face.

The truth of the matter is that unhappiness cannot survive acceptance.

At the beginning you may find this challenging. But try taking a few deep breaths to centre yourself first. What that will do, is will create distance between you and your negative emotion. And you will find it much easier to accept it.

Which leads me to another mistake we do when it comes to our emotions.

We identify ourselves with the emotions.

We say:

“I am happy.”

“I am angry.”

“I am sad.”

And that’s how we trap ourselves within the emotion itself. Why that’s bad, you ask? – You become the emotion and that’s making it difficult to see it for what it is, a temporary feeling that soon will pass.

Instead, say:

“I feel happy.”

“I feel angry.”

“I feel sad.”

This not only creates a distance between you and the emotion, but it also implies that the emotion is temporary and it will soon change.

Let’s conclude. 

When dealing with a negative emotion, all you need to do is:

1. Create a distance between you and the emotion by changing how you speak to yourself and others. Instead of saying “I am unhappy.” say “”I feel unhappy at the moment.”
2. Don’t go into the cycle of feeding the negative emotion. Instead, take a deep breath, and accept it. Whatever, has made you unhappy happened and your emotion cannot change it. So the faster you accept it and move on, the better.

 There you go girl.

Let me know if you have any questions in the comments bellow.