8 ideas to manage sadness

Happiness has become the impossible longing of those who escape unpleasant emotions at full speed, fleeing without knowing where or why. At least consciously.

"You are here to be happy" 4.2 billion dollars has been spent by a well-known soft drink brand to make us understand. The reality is different.

• Related article: "The 8 types of emotions (classification and description)"

Sadness, the great enemy

We know that happiness and joy are not the same thing and that sooner or later sadness appears on the scene, an emotion more unpleasant than negative.

This emotion appears when we have the feeling of having lost something valuable, be it a person, an object, or even an opportunity (who has not felt sad when an illusion has fallen, or when we realize that we are not the same person as before the pandemic?). The loss does not have to be perceived as irreversible, and the more significant the loss is to us, the more sad we will feel.

The sadness helps us to be introspective, to analyze a situation without excessive optimism and to evaluate a problem

. On the social level, it invites others to feel empathy and encourages help.

In addition, we are less demanding with those who are sad, since it works as a safe conduct in the face of responsibilities or schedules (sometimes too profitable for those who are sad!).

When it comes strong, it doesn't come alone. It is followed by feelings of mental and physical lack of vitality, loss of enthusiasm, and slowed metabolism.

Let's make some suggestions for dealing with sadness

These are several key ideas in learning to manage sadness.

1. Sadness is part of the emotional rainbow that we can feel

Receive the emotion and reflect on what it tells you. If you try to avoid it, it will reappear. In general, when we talk about emotions, "what you throw through the door comes back through the window."

2. Shame for being sad?

When they tell us “don't cry”, “be a man”... We learn to hide sadness as if it were part of something that is not normal. Try to share it! Socializing emotions helps us manage them. Feeling understood makes our sadness lose intensity so that we can detach ourselves from it and look at the situation more objectively.

3. It doesn't matter if you don't really know where it comes from and where it's going!

Sometimes we get stuck in the "need" to resolve our sadness; that is, to know perfectly where it comes from. This over-analysis can cause some paralysis, getting into a vicious circle from which it is difficult to get out.

• You may be interested in: "The 'paralysis of analysis'; when overthinking it becomes a problem "

4. Take time to be sad

You don't have to sink if you live the emotion. It is not that dangerous.

5. Manage time before making decisions

If you have important decisions to make, value the possibility of postponing them If you think that sadness has taken you

6. Don't forget about the physical

Get the best sleep you can, exercise, and engage in activities that you like to do or liked to do. This point is crucial.

People often say "since I'm sad, I don't do what I like because I'm not going to have the same time." Go against this scheme, do things despite being sad! This does not mean that you do not have moments to embrace sadness, it is not a call to avoid it.

7. Learn from the crises of the past

Look at those experiences in which you felt failure, loss and pain in the past and try to relate them to your current situation.

8. Pay attention to the thoughts that accompany sadness

Often this emotion comes hand in hand with particular ways of approaching reality. These "glasses of sadness" are graduated so that life seems grayer than it is. Thus, sadness tells us that our successes are worth less than our failures, that things are more difficult than they are, that a mistake will have more painful consequences than it will have and that we have little ability to influence the results that we wait.

Concluding

Definitely, fleeing sadness is fleeing a part of life. Trying to amputate the pain will make it encyst more than necessary, making it stay with us like a phantom limb that orbits our day-to-day lives.

As an inspiring Chinese proverb says: you cannot prevent the bird of sadness from flying over your head, but you can prevent it from nesting in your hair.