The Sweetness of Opposition: Owning Negative Emotion

I listened to a podcast on Saturday by Brooke Castillo about owning negative emotion. I thought it was really interesting. She talked about how we often get stuck in feeling like if we aren’t feeling a positive emotion all the time then there is something wrong with us. Especially when we are in the work of being intentional about personal growth. It’s easy to feel like a fraud or something if you are feeling negative emotion.  She also talked about the benefits of really experiencing (rather than resisting) negative emotion and how it deepens our life experience and capacity to feel positive emotion as well.  

 

I loved the podcast so much that I actually listened to it again and transcribed it (one, because listening to it more slowly helps me to digest the information better and two, because sometimes when I hear something that really resonates with me, I like to write it down and keep it in my journal.)  I would love to just put the entire podcast on here, but that would be way too long.  I highly recommend clicking on that link and listening to it though.  🙂

Here are the main things that I learned and some of my favorite excerpts from the episode… 

1. We are not supposed to feel positive emotion 100% of the time.  

 

We learn in the scriptures about how there is opposition in all things and that is how it is supposed to be.  We need opposition in order to have agency.  We also need opposition so that we can have a full life experience.

 

“For it must needs be, that there is an opposition in all things. If not so, my firstborn in the wilderness, righteousness could not be brought to pass, neither wickedness, neither holiness nor misery, neither good nor bad. Wherefore, all things must needs be a compound in one; wherefore, if it should be one body it must needs remain as dead, having no life neither death, nor corruption nor incorruption, happiness nor misery, neither sense nor insensibility.”  2 Nephi 2:11

 

 

2. When we resist negative emotions we are doing ourselves a disservice.  

 

Multiple disservices actually. 

 

Resisting the negative emotion actually feels worse (and often results in regret) than just accepting, allowing, and processing it.  In my experience, resisting a negative emotion doesn’t make the emotion go away.  It is like a beach ball that is held under the surface of the water.  Eventually it builds up so much pressure that it can’t be held under anymore.  It explodes up to the surface and up into the air. That’s how negative emotions work too.  When we resist them and push them down, they eventually build up too much pressure and they release in a more extreme way.  

 
 

In contrast to that, if we accept, allow, and process the negative emotion, it is still there.  But it isn’t being held under.  It is just allowed to float on the surface of the water until it floats away.  It might come back again, depending on the situation and if you have changed your thoughts about the circumstance or not, but when it comes back, you can just accept, allow, and process it again.   

 

3. Being truly alive means experiencing the positive and the negative. 

“Our ability to deal with negative emotion is going to come from experiencing negative emotion. And if I am constantly trying to dismiss negative emotion or control my life in a way where I won’t ever experience negative emotion then I’m really going to miss out on half of the experience of being alive. We can stay in our homes and never leave and never enter into any relationships that will cause us pain and kind of avoid those experiences of contrast and negative emotion but we are also going to miss out on the full experience of being alive. So I think the more alive we are willing to be, the more negative emotion we are going to experience.” (Brooke Castillo)

“I think that most of what we are experiencing with our clients through life coaching and through weight coaching right now is, I would say, an epidemic of people resisting and avoiding emotion. I think they spend so much time trying to be happy without actually being happy and making the effort to do that by resisting anything that feels like a negative vibration in their body. And the way that they do that is by pretending it’s not there, pushing it away, and avoiding it. I think that really understanding that the way to enjoy life is not by putting the breaks on negative emotion. And in fact, it’s the opposite. It’s by really opening ourselves up to diving into the negative emotion that gives us the full experience of what it means to be alive. And I think that is ultimate happiness.” (Brooke Castillo)

 

4. Being willing to feel your feelings takes great courage

“I think that feeling your feelings is the most courageous thing anyone can ever do. And when you are willing to feel any emotion, that’s when you’ll be willing to take any action because you won’t be afraid of the emotion that might accompany it.” (Brooke Castillo)

5. Experiencing negative emotions deepens our capacity to feel positive emotions. 

“Because we have been resisting our emotion for so long, we don’t even know what it’s like to experience an emotion. We only know what it’s like to resist an emotion. And avoid an emotion. What’s it like to actually feel it? And for many of us, this experience of taking this moment to be in that discomfort of negative emotion is the first time they’ve ever even done it. It’s like the first time someone has ever lifted weights. They’re like “I’m not lifting weights. That looks like it will hurt.” And it does hurt a little bit, but the benefits of experiencing it are tremendous. And it’s the same with experiencing negative emotion. So if you give yourself a certain period of time everyday to just allow whatever negative emotion you are feeling to come up and be experienced, to flow through you with full acceptance, You will actually learn the skill of how to feel a negative emotion. And when you learn how to feel a negative emotion, you also learn how to feel a positive emotion. You’re learning how to feel. So many of us have learned how to resist emotion and avoid emotion for so long, we literally don’t know how to feel. So, the best way to do anything is to do it, and do it consistently.” (Brooke Castillo)

When I heard Brooke talk about this, it really resonated with me.  In general I am a very “toned down” person.  I am not very expressive externally.  That sometimes bothers me, but I am also coming to terms with that and accepting that I am that way and it’s not always a bad thing.  What does bother me though is that I don’t feel like I am very expressive internally either.  

 

I feel like I am missing out on some of the depth of life. I think that perhaps I have been in a habit of resisting negative emotions (when they come up) for so long that I feel like it has impacted my capacity to really feel the depth of positive emotion as well.  I don’t think I am like this in an extreme way or anything.  I definitely do still experience feelings – both positive and negative, but my feelings  are toned down.  I guess I just don’t feel all the way alive in that area. I have brief moments here and there, but for the most part, I feel out of touch with my deeper feelings – both positive and negative.  I feel like I have a hard time being truly empathetic when other people are going through something hard.  I don’t feel good or happy for them, obviously, but I have a really hard time knowing how to help them because I have a hard time feeling for them.  I just get stumped and don’t know what to do.  I don’t know if that makes any sense to anyone else.  Just trying to describe my mental and emotional thoughts and feelings about this interesting struggle of mine. 

 

When negative emotions come up, I often feel out of control and just want them to go away. So I just resist and avoid and try to control. This never ends well. I end up not only grumpy, angry, regretful, and a bad mom (or wife, friend, etc.) but I also have just done myself a disservice. I haven’t taken advantage of the experience of processing it and I haven’t allowed that negative emotion (the opposition) to do it’s job. I haven’t allowed it to deepen my capacity to feel  – to feel more empathy for others, and to make my future positive emotions and experiences sweeter and deeper.    

 

6. Establish a daily practice: Set aside 10 minutes a day to feel your feelings and really experience them and/or do a thought download

“So, 10 minutes a day, when you feel yourself wanting to escape (you know what it is you do to escape to yourself,) instead of doing that, invite whatever ugliness you think is inside of you to come up. And just notice it with fascination and with curiosity, and not with judgment. For some of you it may be rage. For some of you be sadness. For some of you it may be depression. It may be disappointment. Can you give yourself 10 minutes to experience that emotion in it’s purity. And really notice what it feels like and what it’s like to experience it. And how long does it really last? Do you know how long a negative emotion lasts? Most of you are gonna say no because you’ve never even allowed it to come through.” (Brooke)

“So when I’m saying “experience negative emotion and give yourself the time to actually allow that emotion to come up,” I’m not suggesting that you’re reacting to that negative emotion. I’m just suggesting that you are letting it be there and letting it be what it is. And that is a very different energy. And I think in the beginning it’s really important to give yourself some time. Maybe say “ok, at noon, I’m going to sit down and really let my negative emotion come up.” And if it doesn’t come up, what I suggest is that you sit down and do a thought download. You just write down all of the negative thoughts that are in your brain. And know that there will be some negative thoughts in there and that’s ok. By pretending they’re not there, and not owning them, you can’t change them. And I think there is real power in that word, owning. 

I actually put this in my post when I went through my shame experience. Shame doesn’t like to be owned, it likes to own you. That’s how my experience is of it. And when I own it as my own, “this is my shame. I am experiencing the shame. And in fact, I am creating the shame with my brain. This is my shame. It doesn’t come over me. It doesn’t attack me. It doesn’t get me. I am the one creating the attack. This is my experience to fully accept and take responsibility for.” I will tell you what, that will change your experience with your emotion and I can’t say that it will feel good, because it won’t. Most negative emotion doesn’t. It doesn’t feel great in our body, but it is part of the experience. And it is part of what it means to truly accept ourselves as we are. When you accept your negative emotion, when you allow it, then you can heal from it. You know that it’s not going to last forever. You know that it’s going to pass through you and your body will take care of it and then you will move on. Instead of pretending that you don’t have it, you just give into it. You just allow it. Without reacting to it. You just be with it. Just let it be. Just be with whatever emotion is with you right now. That’s what it means to be alive. And when you look at the overall trajectory of your entire life, if you want the main experience to be some level of contentment and happiness, I truly believe that means accepting the emotion that you’re feeling and also not judging it something that shouldn’t be happening. Just allowing it as an experience of your life. And then giving yourself access to what you’re thinking that’s creating it, without trying to change it. I mean, I think that’s the most courageous thing we can do – to be with ourselves.” (Brooke)

 

I decided to make this daily practice a part of my morning routine.  I listened to this podcast this past weekend when we were out of town.  We got back on Sunday evening so on Monday morning, during my morning routine, I sat down with a blank piece of paper and just started writing down any thoughts that came into my mind.  I had woken up that morning feeling kind of blah but it was a bunch of random thoughts so I didn’t really know which one in particular needed to be processed, that’s why I just did the thought download. It actually really helped to clear my head and I felt much better at the end. 

 

After the thought download, I noticed some self-coaching work that needed to be done.  So I got out another blank paper and plugged one of my issues into the CTFAR model.  Someday I’ll do an entire post about the model, but I learned it from my life coach, Jody Moore.  Basically, Circumstances trigger Thoughts which create our Feelings, which create our Actions, which create our Results.   The result points back to the thought.  So if I want a different result with something in my life then I need to change my thought.   

 

For the past 4 days so far, I have continued this habit of doing a thought download and then running a model (or two).  It has been really helpful.  And also, I have just felt more clarity and peace throughout the day.  I plan to make this a regular part of my morning routine.      

 

I know that this is just the first step.  Really diving into the experience of processing a negative emotion will take a lot practice.  But I am becoming more convinced that I want to be up to the challenge.  

 

 

7. The Fear of feeling negative emotion and the resistance are much bigger problems than the actual emotion itself. 

“Think about that with your children. It’s so tempting when they’re crying to say “oh no, you’re ok. You’re ok. Don’t cry. You’re alright. Toughen up. You can be good here. You got this.” Because we don’t want our kids to cry because we want them to be happy all the time. Well, the same is for us. We have some kind of negative emotion come up and we say “oh you’re ok, you’re ok. Don’t worry about it. Just eat something.” Instead of “no, no, no. Here’s negative emotion. This is part of the experience. I’m going to take some time and really dive into this one and really see what this is all about. I’m going to let this be part of my life instead of pretending like it isn’t. And then you will stop controlling everything around your life and stop avoiding things that you might want to do because of your fear of feeling negative emotion. The fear of feeling negative emotion and the resistance to feeling negative emotion are much bigger problems than the actual emotion itself.” (Brooke)

 

I feel like this concept is so freeing.  Imagine what kind of great things I could accomplish and who I could become if I wasn’t afraid to feel negative emotion.  So inspiring and empowering.  

 

 

Another thought that I had was that I think that something else that holds me back from feeling more depth with positive emotions is that some fear is involved.  It’s like I am afraid to really feel the positive emotion too deeply – because what if it doesn’t last?  What if some terrifying or horrible thing happens in my life?  I don’t want to get too attached to the positive – like I am using that to protect me from getting hurt too deeply.  Because the greater I feel the positive, the more capacity I will have to really feel the negative if (more like when) it happens.  And that sounds painful.  But I am realizing through this that it will be even more painful if I resist the negative emotion that will come.  Experiencing the negative emotion will probably be a better (cleansing, healing, deepening, etc.) experience than I can imagine. 

 

So I think that I could work on really experiencing the positive emotions in my everyday life as well.  Really dive into them.  Because the more I experience the positive, the more alive I will be.  And then I need to trust and not be afraid of negative emotion that will come. 

 

Opposition makes life sweeter – if we allow it to by really diving in and experiencing the negative and the positive.  

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