Beware Of Sadness, It Can Become A Vice
Sadness is as necessary as joy. But for a few decades in Western society a false “happiness” has been demanded of us, which leads us not to experience the emotions necessary for our growth in a healthy way. It seems that it is only valid to show the pretty face of our life, as if it were forbidden to feel and show emotions that do not accompany this obsession to be happy at all times.
Sadness is a necessary emotion, but the fact that it becomes a vice or a recurring state indicates that we have to pay more attention when it comes to improving our emotional management. Even when being sad is natural, in the face of the loss of a loved one, the knowledge of an illness or the loss of a job, it can turn into an unhealthy emotion when it reaches very high levels of intensity or is perpetuated over time.
Another type of sadness, more maladaptive, is one that arises from not loving oneself. It is the result of despising ourselves without knowing it, and not the attribution of the lack of affection of others. We are sad and not wanting anything because we subjectivized that others do not understand what happens inside us.
When does sadness stop being adaptive?
Sadness is considered one of the basic emotions, corresponding to innate affective reactions, present in all human beings and necessary for a correct emotional regulation in negative situations.
The presence in our lives of emotions such as sadness is normal and adaptive, since it helps us to adapt to reality when we experience situations of physical or psychological separation, loss or failure, disappointment, in the absence of reinforced activities and in the face of the experience of chronic pain, among others.
When this emotion stops being adaptive and is accompanied by other symptoms, such as difficulty falling asleep or sleeping excessively, apathy, loss of illusion, negative thoughts about oneself and about their life, the person’s life suffers an interference. So we are facing a problem.
The presence of negative and distorted thoughts and feelings about reality causes sadness and hopelessness. Sad people perceive themselves as of little value, they get carried away by these emotions in such a way that they abandon their activities. Thus, they are not only perceived as of less value but also abandon activities in which they could contrast with reality this estimate of value, so that the belief is taken as valid.
It is here when the vicious cycle begins, since they put aside their routine and pleasant activities due to their negative mood, without knowing that it is precisely these activities that could help them improve their situation and prevent the low mood from falling. step up. Thus, a dynamic is created in which inactivity “calls” inactivity.
Against sadness, self-esteem
The most maladaptive sadness is not the expression that nobody loves us, but the negative impact of not loving oneself. The origin of this sadness is not the hatred of others, but the self-contempt that is manifested in the thoughts that tend to ruminate in these circumstances.
In some cases, the origin of this tormented world must be sought in the absence of care, affection and love in the first years of our life. The mismanagement of emotions during childhood is the seed planted in his day that today has as its fruit the way to relate to the sadness that we have described.
The importance of self-esteem is that it concerns us, our way of being, and our sense of personal worth. Therefore, it can affect our way of being, acting and relating to others. Nothing in our way of thinking, feeling, deciding and acting escapes the influence of self-esteem.
Having a tight self-esteem helps control negative thoughts and emotions about yourself and others that fuel sadness. A good personal self-assessment removes the feelings of hopelessness, melancholy and sadness that lead us to laziness and abandonment of pleasant activities.
