We tend to think that there are «positive» and «negative» emotions. Positives are good, negatives are bad. And bad emotions are better not to experience at all. But if we brush off the nascent irritation or anxiety, they do not disappear — they turn into rage or fear. But if we accept them, we can hear what these emotions are telling us.
Many of my colleagues, when talking about emotions, divide what they experience into “negative” — bad, and “positive” — good. Sometimes «useful tips» are offered on how to remove all negative emotions from life.
I am closer to the concept of «destructive emotions» — those that destroy us. Often at the moment of the appearance of a signal that we understand as anger, anxiety, irritation, sadness, longing, we try to suppress, remove, not notice what is happening to us, and this accumulates feelings and turns them into something dark. For example, by ignoring anxiety, we allow it to “fester” and cause more fear in us.
Anxiety turns against us and becomes destructive.
42-year-old Anna tells at a consultation how she fell out with a friend. Anna wants to get rid of the irritation that spills out on others. “Yesterday I wrote a post: “How to survive betrayal and trust people again.” Received a lot of responses. Someone thanked, someone wrote that it was impossible to regain trust after betrayal. In the evening I saw another comment: “How to trust people again? No way!” — and felt the indignation roll up to the throat. At that moment, a friend came in, and we quarreled word for word, I didn’t even really understand how it happened.
If we treat ourselves and those emotions that come to us with warmth and tenderness, then we can understand what they are telling us about.
A familiar picture for many of us? What can we see in this quarrel? Anna’s post is not an abstract reasoning, this is her personal story. And “no way” in the comments looks like a reaction to the title, not to the content. This is not the first time Anna has experienced this, and she feels that her experience is being rejected, devalued. The next comment becomes the last straw, the accumulated irritation splashes out on a friend.
Anna feels guilty, realizing that her reaction is overreacting. But irritation appeared in response to the first negative comments, however, having turned on the protective mechanisms, it was as if she had given up on these signals. And the feelings matured, accumulated and eventually led to an explosion.
Instead, Anna could tell a friend about her experience: “I wrote a post, I read the comments, and some of them annoy me. Talk to me about it.» Then she could discuss her concerns and get the support her inner child needed.
We are human beings, we are whole beings, and we are wonderful in our ability to experience a huge range of emotions that allow us to assess the situation, understand what is happening, interact with others, worry about someone, show care, be sad with complicity. If we treat ourselves and those emotions that come to us with warmth and tenderness, then we can understand what they are telling us.