Managing Negative Emotions

Human beings are the most privileged species on Earth.  Our minds are not only more advanced but we are able to feel emotions. Human beings are emotional beings.  This may make some men or even women cringe as some presume that emotions make us weak, irrational or even out of control.  All human beings have emotions whether they display them or not. Emotions are a very important part of who we are as people.  They make us unique and exciting.  Emotions are part of our human experience.

Emotions help us connect with one another and become a social society.  They also help us with a deeper learning, as when we have a strong emotion around a certain experience we will never forget it and that memory will help us make decisions in the future.  Our subconscious stores these memories, good or bad, and calls upon them when a similar situation stands before us.  Emotions play a significant role in how we respond to an experience or to one another.

There are negative and positive emotions and most of us would prefer to experience only positive emotions as they give us feelings of pleasure, satisfaction, joy, comfort and self confidence.  Negative emotions have their place in this world as it creates change, growth, progress and even self-confidence.  Most people try to avoid, deny or suppress negative emotions rather than acknowledge or "feel" them.  Much of our suffering is due to negative emotions not being dealt with called "emotional baggage". The trick is managing these emotions is to finding appropriate ways to release these intense emotions and then understanding the lessons behind them.  By accepting your anger, sadness and embarrassment as the human part of yourself, you can bring about a closer understanding of your true self. 

Negative thoughts have a tendency to distort our feelings.  There is a strong relationship between thoughts and feelings as thoughts drive our feelings.  Negative thoughts drain our emotional energy and motivation, therefore causing dissatisfaction in our lives.  An example would be unnecessarily worrying about a situation that will keep you up all night causing you to be exhausted the next day. The excessive worrying about unrealistic matter resulted in feeling crummy and tired putting us at risk of making poor choices.

Our behaviors are a direct result of our thoughts and feelings and if we want to change our behavior we need to change our way of thinking first.  We need to move from our regular thought patterns in order to develop new possibilities.  To accomplish new feelings and behaviors it is important to know what messages your subconscious is holding.  If they are not beneficial to your new goals, then you need to work hard at replacing them with practical and constructive ones.

Positive thinking is widely recognized and popular today as it is the key to a positive and fulfilling life.  Positive thinking promotes positive feelings that provide high energy and a bright outlook.  Fuelling good moods with ongoing positive thoughts encourages us to act how we feel.  Our actions and behaviors will bring forth our circumstances.  As in The Secret by Rhonda Byrne, the saying “thoughts become things” rings true.  We can manifest many things into our lives by how we think.  The objective is to manage your emotions by purging unproductive thinking and replacing them with intentional positive thoughts to bring forth a more rewarding life.


Treena Wynes, BSW, RSW
Author of Eating Ourselves Crazy
www.f4tw.com