Welcome Your Negative Emotions
By Naseeha Tayob Ibrahim

Read on to understand why it is important to embrace negative emotions.

Published in: Self, Health
Date: 05 / 08 / 21

An important part of therapy is to learn about your emotions and how to express them. There are many people who have a hard time with difficult emotions like anger or fear. What I’ve come to notice s that some people feel the need to apologize for feeing these negative emotions and are overwhelmed with guilt and shame. This comes from a culture of modern living that tells you to be positive all the time. While it positivity is encouraged the problem goes in when you start to believe that you have to be happy-go-lucky all he time.

Let’s clear that up!

Negative emotions are a part of life and in fact, are very important for healthy emotional wellbeing. Suppressing or trying to suppress the thoughts and feelings that come with these emotions, will only back-fire. Textbooks and theories define well-being as “living a positive life where negative emotions are not present” but life is not such that we can live a positive life all the time.

Unpleasant emotions are just as important as the pleasant ones because they help you evaluate your experiences. Negative emotions help you to understand yourself and your life both, in general and in a particular moment. You find meaning in both positive and negative emotions.

Think about that one time you got a paper-cut or a scratch on your leg - it hurt right? And you put a band-aid on it and gave it tender loving care until it healed. That pain you felt was an indicator that a part of you needs attention. In the same way, negative emotions tell you that there’s a part of you that needs to be taken care of. If you surpress it, it adds to your emotional stress.

We are here to live a life fully with everything that comes and goes and in the same way, our emotions will do just that, come and go. But we need to welcome it all and acknowledge it, understand it and then learn to work through it.

About

Naseeha Tayob Ibrahim

I speak. I write. I coach.

I want to make the world a better place.

As an avid reader and writer, it’s no surprise that communications became my career and line of work. There is never one thing in particular that defines who I am, except the fact that I am passionate about everything I do. That made me the odd one out most of my life. It made realize how important it is to listen to my heart.

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