Strategies for Working Through Difficult Emotions

Difficult emotions are going to keep coming, and we can’t just think or wish them away. A conscious effort has to put in to overcome them to be able to welcome positive emotions. We all have to win this occasional battle to stay afloat and survive stress management. Let’s look at the strategies for working through difficult emotions.

Name your emotion for what it is

It is easy to slip into the habit of accusing different things of the cause of our sadness in depressing times. You cannot begin to overcome difficult emotions if you’re afraid or unwilling to confront that emotion for what it is. If you’re feeling sad for something you couldn’t achieve, then go ahead and say it. Telling yourself why you’re sad might seem ridiculous, but you’ll be shocked by the sort of energy that comes from acknowledging why you’re emotions are so flared up.

Calling out your emotions might be far from actually getting past it, but it is the first step. Everyone experiences their emotional rollercoaster, and they are always unique in some way. So, you have to acknowledge the source of your difficult feelings.

Share the truth of your challenges with your loved ones.

It has become traditional to hear people say, “I’m great” whenever they are asked, “How are you?” Sometimes, the response seems to come before the question. That answer has been set to default in most of our minds, so much that a person can give you the “I’m good” response immediately after wiping off tears in the restroom.

This is when people ask about your well being is seems passive, and as though all they really want to year is a positive response. This can be true sometimes. However, when a person you trust asks you about your wellbeing, you should take the courage to tell them the truth if it’s overwhelming to keep to yourself. It’s okay to share that burden.

Face the reality of things with positivity

You can be experiencing difficult emotions in some areas of your life and remain positive about the future. You need to acknowledge a situation for it is to avoid repressing your emotions only for them to resurrect on a later date. Your current challenges can be your source of motivation to excel in your goals.

You can be in distress and engage in goal setting and goal tracking. Accepting your emotions can suppress negativity. It implies living bravely, even in tough times.

Acknowledge that emotions are temporary

Our emotions can cause so much eruption in our lives that we are tempted to think they have come to stay. The truth remains that all emotions are temporary, and the heart-throbbing one you’re feeling now isn’t an exception. With time it will all fade away, and it becomes something to look back on. However, we can always wait for some difficult emotions to disappear as they might cause so much damage to our lives before leaving. So, we need to make conscious efforts to deal with them.

With the mindset that the difficult emotion you’re feeling now would soon fade away, you can always reassure yourself that you’ll be okay. This is a self-help strategy and a great source of motivation and stress management to defeat difficult emotions. The more you keep reminding yourself of the impermanence of your emotions, the more strength you have over them.

You don’t always have to control your emotions.

Another crucial strategy in getting pass your difficult emotions is to let go of the pressure to control them. You can rather stay open to whatever outcome unfolds, especially in situations we have no control over, such as the COVID 19 pandemic. This is also a stress management technique. You need to accept the fact that you can’t always control everything that influences your emotions.

Be patient, kind, and compassionate with yourself and those around you. With time, you’ll realize that all you needed to have done is just go on with your regular life without giving so much attention to all those negative thoughts. You can also focus on your relationship with those around you to channel more positivity to your mind.

Inquire into the source and effect of your difficult emotions

After you’ve successfully soothed yourself from the whole depressing thoughts and emotions swirling your head around, you should take a moment to investigate and understand the cause of all the turmoil. You can start by asking yourself questions like: “What made me feel that way?” “Was it a reaction to something?” “Is it likely to occur again?”

If you can successfully answer these questions, you haven’t just overcome those overwhelming emotions. You’ve also placed yourself on a part not to experience them in such magnitude again (if at all you do experience them again).