Value your negative emotions to be happier

Am I asking you to be unhappy to be happy? No! I am not a Negative Ned; I am just asking you to stop being desperate for being happy. 

Negative emotions are usually considered bad, but they can actually be good. In fact, they are a powerful force that drives us to seek happiness. But when we try to suppress negative emotions, we often end up feeling even worse.

In this article, you’ll learn how the pursuit of happiness could make you miserable, some myths about happiness, and how to value your negative emotions, using them to your advantage.

I’d rather be whole than good.

Carl Jung

What does the research say about avoiding negative emotions and happiness?

Overvaluing happiness 

Happiness is one of the most desired values (and emotions) in the Western world. Happiness has indeed been proven in studies to be helpful to one’s interpersonal connections, career opportunities, and general well-being. However, surprisingly, a subset of recent research has questioned the usefulness of this western cultural ideal, indicating that putting a high priority on one’s happiness might, paradoxically, lead to less happiness.

It was shown that persons who placed a very high value on happiness also devalued negative emotions, which was linked with increased depression-like symptoms, poorer life satisfaction, and lower self-esteem.

In other words, participants who agreed with statements like “How happy I am at any given moment says a lot about how worthwhile my life is” were more likely to agree with statements like “I tend to put a lot of pressure on myself not to feel depressed or anxious,” which explained some of their lower psychological well-being.

It has also been shown that this can be stepped up further, leading to what is known as Toxic Positivity.

Toxic Positivity

Toxic positivity is the belief that people should have a positive attitude no matter how awful or harsh their circumstances are. Toxic positivity pushes positive thinking to its rigid, overgeneralized, over-the-top extreme. While optimism is good for mental health, toxic positivity not only emphasizes the necessity of optimism it also suppresses and rejects any evidence of human emotions that aren’t solely happy, pleasant, or positive.

So you end up hearing statements like “just stay positive” when something terrible happens. “Everything happens for a reason” when someone dies or shaming you for not “choosing happiness” when you are facing adversity. 

Toxic positivity is a problem because:

• It is shaming
• It causes guilt
• Promotes avoidance behavior
• Ignores real harm
• Demeans a loss
• Associated with feelings of worthlessness

Although positive thinking has its advantages, no one can think all of the time positively. Forcing someone to express only good feelings can limit communication and make them feel guilty about themselves for having negative ideas; thus, it gets “toxic.”

This is by no means an exclusive, all-encompassing list, but I am sure you understand how it works. Often overvaluation of happiness and a toxic positive mindset thrives because you believe in one or more myths about happiness. 

Some myths about happiness

No one describes the myths around being happy more than Dr. Russ Harris. According to Dr. Harris, happiness is living a “rich, full, and meaningful life,” and I like that idea. So I further shortened it to “Feeling Fulfilled.” 

Myth 1. Happiness is the natural state for all humans

The belief says that if you provide a person with adequate food, housing, and connection, they will always be happy. It simply isn’t true, but our culture now believes it is. This viewpoint ignores social isolation, bullying, disease, loneliness, and catastrophic occurrences such as death. However, the fact of being human is that we experience an ever-changing flow of emotions – which is entirely normal and natural.

Unfortunately, many people go through life believing that everyone else is content except for them. And, as you might expect, this belief leads to even more unhappiness.

Myth 2. If you are not happy, you are defective

As a logical consequence of Myth 1, Western society believes mental suffering is unnatural. The truth is that if you aren’t constantly happy, you are perfectly normal! Human existence is sometimes challenging, and our brains are complicated as well — they frequently get us wrapped up in lies. Life may be extremely wonderful at times, but it can also be very difficult. If you are not always joyful, there is nothing flawed, broken, or wrong with you.

Despite the widespread belief that psychological pain is abnormal, feeling sad is natural. Feeling nervous, stressed, or unhappy is simply the brain performing its job. You are not defective; your brain is merely performing its job, which it evolved to do.

Myth 3. To create a better life, we must get rid of negative feelings.

We live in a feel-good culture where it is necessary to attain happiness. And what is it that society teaches us?

We are taught to eliminate unpleasant feelings and replace them with ‘positive’ ones, only if it worked like that! Life is full of both good and bad emotions. Every worthwhile project we undertake. Although they frequently elicit sentiments of excitement and enthusiasm, they also frequently elicit feelings of worry, dread, and anxiety.

So, if you believe Myth 3, you’re in grave danger since it’s nearly impossible to create a better life if you’re not willing to experience any unpleasant emotions.

Anything meaningful is filled with both pleasure and pain

Dr. Russ Harris.

Myth 4. You should be able to control what you think and feel 

It’s not that we don’t have any control over our thoughts and feelings; it’s simply that we have far less control than the “experts” would have us think. Yet, unfortunately, myth four is accepted by the vast majority of self-help programs.

The basic concept of these programs is that you will discover happiness if you question your negative thoughts or pictures and instead continuously fill your mind with happy thoughts and images. Of course, you may wish things to be that simple, but it isn’t. Add to that the fact that as your level of distress rises, your capacity to manage your thoughts and emotions falls. 

You may want to read my post on Unconditional Self Acceptance to gain some insights into how to deal with this myth. I am sure by now you know that negative emotions are impossible to avoid but do read on.

Why should you value your negative emotions?

Negative emotions are natural. 

We experience negative emotions when we do not achieve what we want, seek, or prefer. This is natural. This is human. It is difficult and harmful to be apathetic when our desires are unfulfilled. To feel indifference or no negative emotion when we do not get what we want, we must give up our desire for what we want, which is impossible if we are, to be honest with ourselves. 

Negative emotions are a survival mechanism.

Negative emotions have evolved out of our need to survive. Negative emotions, in effect, exist to inform us that something needs to change and push us to accomplish that change.

Negative emotions can promote thorough and analytical thinking, as well as less conventional thinking. Sadness, for example, might sharpen our concentration, allowing us to learn from our mistakes and better appraise social circumstances. Some more examples are 

• Anxiety indicates that something has to be learned, and our well-being may be jeopardized. It can help us problem solve. 
• Anger again points to a threat to your self, self-esteem, or moral self and leads to revolutions.
• Fear is an inducement to raise your levels of safety.
• Frustration or resentment drives us to make a change in a relationship.
• Guilt can be a moral reckoning board 
• Envy can lead to motivation to be better than your competitor 

If you think that something is amiss here because people suffer and become sick due to these emotions. Several of these are associated with medical disorders. You are indeed correct. The key is learning to differentiate between healthy and unhealthy negative emotions. 

Differentiate between unhealthy and healthy negative emotions

Rational Emotive Behavioural Therapy (REBT) distinguishes between healthy and pathological negative emotions. This contrast is also made by Stoic and Buddhist philosophies, which teach that while pain in life is unavoidable, suffering is optional. REBT and, in turn, CBT draws heavily from both ancient and modern philosophies.

There are eight healthy negative emotions and eight unhealthy counterparts.

Unhealthy negative emotions: 

Anxiety, depression, anger, guilt, shame, hurt, unhealthy jealousy, and unhealthy envy: interfere with constructive actions and result in inaction or destructive behavior. 

An unhealthy negative emotion is an unhealthy or unreasonable emotional reaction to an impending or existing unfavorable event. It distorts an individual’s perception of what can actually be changed and prevents them from accepting constructively what cannot be changed. As a result, it sabotages the individual’s potential to progress toward pleasure, goals, aspirations, and purposes.

Healthy negative emotions: 

Concern, sadness, healthy anger or annoyance, remorse, regret, disappointment, healthy jealousy, and healthy envy: produce self-helping and community helping actions.

We can feel a healthy negative emotion by holding healthy beliefs or rational thinking about the adversity we are facing. Dr. Albert Ellis offered four criteria for healthy beliefs.

Healthy beliefs or attitudes are:

• Flexible – open to all possibilities
• Logical
• Consistent with reality
• Helpful

Agreed that it may not be very easy to change your thinking, but with practice, it is possible. This has to be combined with Unconditional Self Acceptance for optimal results. If you think you cannot do this yourself, seek the help of a qualified REBT/CBT therapist. 

Conclusion 

You will not always be happy. Trying to do so gets to be toxic. Life will involve not getting what we want, and disappointment, sadness, or negative emotions are healthy when this unfortunately happens. The important thing is to have an attitude about deprivation that leads to a constructive attempt to change what can be changed and accept what cannot be changed healthily.