Allow yourself to experience sadness without fear, as this liberation can lead to living life more fully and experiencing greater highs.
Cultivate the fundamental idea that sadness and bad things are an inevitable part of life, and not necessarily your fault. This mindset helps reduce shame and the belief that you are to blame when unfortunate events occur.
Cease attempts to fight, deny, or block out sadness and other emotions. Fighting sadness leads to numbing out, dissociation, and can be linked to addiction.
Avoid suppressing negative thoughts or emotions when they arise. Suppressing them doesn’t work and can actually make you feel worse.
Pay attention to your sadness, as it is a temporary emotion that acts as a message telling you when something is wrong. Listening to it can prevent it from becoming more serious or staying longer.
Actively work to reduce your fear of being sad. Being terrified of sadness is what makes it detrimental to your health and well-being.
Allow yourself to sit with normal sadness, even if it’s uncomfortable, rather than trying to fix it immediately. Normal sadness requires being tolerated and sat with for a while.
Allow yourself to properly grieve losses when they occur. The inability to grieve can have long-term negative impacts on various areas of your life.
Actively challenge the cultural norm of keeping sadness to yourself. The ‘stiff upper lip’ mantra is detrimental, making you feel worse and missing opportunities for connection.
Be more vulnerable and honest about how you’re feeling with others. Vulnerability leads to deeper and purer connections with the people in your life.
Be more honest with people around you when you’re feeling sad, and open up when someone offers a caring ear. This fosters connection and allows for support.
Find at least one person you can talk to who will listen without interruption or judgment. Having someone to talk to is crucial for processing sadness, especially when professional help is inaccessible.
Be a ‘whirlpool repair gal/guy’ for others by offering a caring, non-judgmental ear, and ask follow-up questions like ‘How are you really?’ This provides crucial social support and connection for those who are struggling.
Foster and maintain weak social connections with people you see often. These connections are powerful for boosting happiness and overcoming negative emotions, and their absence is deeply felt.
Stop apologizing for your sadness or other emotions. You should only apologize for wrongdoing, not for simply having feelings.
Recognize and challenge the ‘shit FM’ voice in your head that broadcasts negative self-talk. This voice is not ‘you’; being aware of it helps differentiate your feelings from this internal critic.
If your ‘shit FM’ (negative self-talk) plays for more than a couple of days, reach out to a trusted listener to talk. Talking to someone who listens without judgment can help address persistent negative internal monologues.
Do not use excessive busyness or workaholism as a coping mechanism to avoid pain or sadness. This strategy is problematic; sadness will eventually return and build up.
Let go of the pursuit of perfectionism. Perfectionism is a problematic mindset that leads to anxiety, depression, and other health issues.
Make sure to prioritize and get adequate rest. Rest is essential for restoring yourself and is often undervalued in society.
Ensure you maintain balance in your life, especially by not working too hard, even if other self-care practices are in place. Overworking can still throw things ‘out of whack,’ highlighting the importance of overall balance.
Recognize and utilize temporary sadness as a problem-solving emotion. Sadness can increase attention to detail, perseverance, generosity, gratitude, and creativity, prompting you to think about next steps.
Find a cause you care about and a way to help others, using your sadness journey to develop empathy and purpose. This transforms suffering into something useful, aiding acceptance and helping you be sad ‘well’.
Engage in acts of service or help others, especially when you are feeling sad. Doing good for others makes you feel better and provides a useful outlet for sadness.
Learn to tolerate discomfort and pain, rather than avoiding it from an early age. Avoiding discomfort from childhood prevents building resilience and the ability to handle difficult parts of life.
Permit yourself to cry when feeling sad. Crying lowers cortisol levels, soothes you, and expresses emotion, which has value.
Engage with music or books as companions when feeling sad. They can help you feel less alone without minimizing, ignoring, or numbing the sadness.
Broaden your perspective on sadness by understanding different cultural and historical approaches to it. This helps challenge ingrained beliefs about sadness and realize that your socialization isn’t the only way to view it.
Use films, music, or other cultural ‘vitamins’ as tools for emotional arousal and release, especially when on the verge of crying. This allows for a cathartic experience and provides a companion in sadness.
Do not engage in excessive drinking. Excessive drinking does not help with achieving acceptance or dealing with sadness.
Pay attention to when you feel sad and notice if you are using hyper-busyness to block out those feelings. This awareness helps identify and stop counterproductive avoidance strategies.
If you recognize that you are feeling particularly avoidant, commit to gently sitting with your feelings for a few minutes. This helps you process emotions rather than avoiding them.
Allow children to engage in risky play and play in nature (e.g., climbing trees, minor falls). This helps build resilience and reduces psychiatric problems in later life.