[NT] What ought we do with negative feelings?

[ygolo]

Let us say one begins to feel worthless and hopeless, and knows these feelings are greatly out of proprtion to the events that triggered them.

What is the best course of action:
1) Distract oneself with diversions?
2) Exercise, rely on endorphins and better sustained health to make the ill-feelings disappear?
3) Keep a "stiff upper lip" and keep doing what needs to be done?
4) Keep telling yourself that the feelngs are not proportional to the situation and hope they go away?
5) Embrace fully the feelings and do what the associated impulse are with a belief that they will be "out of your system?"
6) Seek professional help?
7) Something else?

 

[INTJMom]

I think we should just let them eat us alive.

 

[Jack Flak]

1, 2, 3, 5, 7. 6 for some.

 

[ajblaise]

Rationalize them to death.

 

[INTJMom]

Let us say one begins to feel worthless and hopeless, and knows these feelings are greatly out of proportion to the events that triggered them.

What is the best course of action:
1) Distract oneself with diversions?
2) Exercise, rely on endorphins and better sustained health to make the ill-feelings disappear?
3) Keep a "stiff upper lip" and keep doing what needs to be done?
4) Keep telling yourself that the feelings are not proportional to the situation and hope they go away?
5) Embrace fully the feelings and do what the associated impulse are with a belief that they will be "out of your system?"
6) Seek professional help?
7) Something else?

Kidding aside... what you are addressing sounds serious.

In my experience, feeling worthless and hopeless, out of proportion to the event that triggered it, is usually caused by the re-opening or touching of an unhealed wound from the past. Sometimes I know what the past wound is, and sometimes I don't.

Ignoring the feelings will just make the same thing happen again at another time.
It is important to deal with the pain by facing it.

It depends on the person I guess but what has successfully worked for me several times is using the steps of the grieving process to face the pain. I write down all my feelings and cry or get angry if I need to. I end up forgiving the person/s who caused the original wound, and I am ready to accept my life and re-invest in it again.

As I said this method has worked for me several times,
on even the most painful wounds of my life.

 

[ygolo]

I am feeling worthless and hopeless after a mediocre review--which was "not below expecations" but "still concerning"--the worst review, I've gotten, and its "not below expectations." Feelings are not proportional to event that triggered it, and it was lingered for a while.

I've noticed I get these feeling whenever my performance gets near or below average in some group. It almost makes no difference what it is. But having it happen at work is most disconcerting.

But there are other things too. Even when I got a ticket (I didn't get any traffic tickets till last year, and then I got 3 in the span of two years).

I does not make any sense. I don't know what "past wound" I would have either.

 

[Thursday]

Rationalize them to death.

it works for me
i usually just picture killing the person, seductively
but yeah - whatever floats your boat or cuts your brakes :hi:

 

[ThatsWhatHeSaid]

Allow yourself to experience them, don't be critical, don't be fearful, and examine what they're about and from where they emanate without pushing them away hastily. It takes practice.

 

[Thursday]

Allow yourself to experience them, don't be critical, don't be fearful, and examine what they're about and from where they emanate without pushing them away hastily. It takes practice.

 

[INTJMom]

I am feeling worthless and hopeless after a mediocre review--which was "not below expectations" but "still concerning"--the worst review, I've gotten, and its "not below expectations." Feelings are not proportional to event that triggered it, and it was lingered for a while.

I've noticed I get these feeling whenever my performance gets near or below average in some group. It almost makes no difference what it is. But having it happen at work is most disconcerting.

But there are other things too. Even when I got a ticket (I didn't get any traffic tickets till last year, and then I got 3 in the span of two years).

I does not make any sense. I don't know what "past wound" I would have either.

Do you know what your enneagram is?
Maybe the answer is in there somewhere.

But yeah, "not below expectations" is like a punch in the stomach.

If you can't remember what the wound is right off the top of your head, I don't recommend going into your past memory and stirring up trouble, but maybe spending 10 or 15 minutes on thinking back and trying to recall the first time you ever felt that way would be good.
It could be perfection-related or shame-related, and almost always parent-related.

 

[Eldanen]

Number five is good, along with rationalization. I enjoy catharsis, although I've been able to do it relatively little lately.

 

[ygolo]

Do you know what your enneagram is?
Maybe the answer is in there somewhere.

But yeah, "not below expectations" is like a punch in the stomach.

If you can't remember what the wound is right off the top of your head, I don't recommend going into your past memory and stirring up trouble, but maybe spending 10 or 15 minutes on thinking back and trying to recall the first time you ever felt that way would be good.
It could be perfection-related or shame-related, and almost always parent-related.

I think I am an enneagram 5. But I haven't spent enough time looking.

I've been trying to remember the very first time I felt that way, and I don't know when it started. It seems every memory where I've done average or worse has that feeling for me. Though as an adult that has bothered me a lot less on things like video games and other things I don't deem important.

 

[INTJMom]

5 - Enneagram Type Five: The Investigator

Type Five in Brief

Fives are alert, insightful, and curious. They are able to concentrate and focus on developing complex ideas and skills. Independent, innovative, and inventive, they can also become preoccupied with their thoughts and imaginary constructs. They become detached, yet high-strung and intense. They typically have problems with eccentricity, nihilism, and isolation. At their Best: visionary pioneers, often ahead of their time, and able to see the world in an entirely new way.

• Basic Fear: Being useless, helpless, or incapable
• Basic Desire: To be capable and competent

 

[Bella]

Let us say one begins to feel worthless and hopeless, and knows these feelings are greatly out of proprtion to the events that triggered them.

What is the best course of action:
1) Distract oneself with diversions?
2) Exercise, rely on endorphins and better sustained health to make the ill-feelings disappear?
3) Keep a "stiff upper lip" and keep doing what needs to be done?
4) Keep telling yourself that the feelngs are not proportional to the situation and hope they go away?
5) Embrace fully the feelings and do what the associated impulse are with a belief that they will be "out of your system?"
6) Seek professional help?
7) Something else?

3 and 4, and on a slightly more enlightened day I'll try the first half of 5.

 

[disregard]

Negative feelings are there for you. They help you learn about yourself. They tell you what you value, your expectations, how you view yourself and others.

I don't know what you ought to do with them.

I usually face them, try to understand why I'm feeling that way, try to put things in perspective, and remind myself that feeling badly about something is the first step to feeling okay.

 

[Totenkindly]

Let us say one begins to feel worthless and hopeless, and knows these feelings are greatly out of proportion to the events that triggered them. What is the best course of action:

It depends on your personality.

I can "power" through them.
But I know people who are more emotion-based who just can't do it.
It used to frustrate me a lot to see that.
But I realized that we need different strategies.

With me, I just need reassurance/input that I can cling to, to help me believe that I honestly am not worthless/hopeless. If I think the latter is "truth," then I can cling to it. If I have not gotten data that lets me know that the situation is not hopeless or that I have value, then that's where I get confused.

So I go data collecting.
And I check my physical needs to make sure they aren't causing the swing either.
I can also try to "change the situation" so I feel I have some power.

as far as your list, I've done:

1, 2, 4, 6

However, #1 is not a long-term solution.
#2 is not always effective, depending on the root case.
#3 (which I don't endorse in general) is only good if you HAVE to get through the situation and your feelings just can't be allowed to interfere; but it is a terrible long-term strategy.
#4, I would cross off the last part; you need to accept the feelings might NEVER go away but that you are giving them more credit than they deserve, and you learn to reroute your thinking pattern to avoid basing decisions on those particular feelings. (basically, consider your "feelings tree" to be defective because it's telling you things that are not true or that would destroy you; so you have to reroute and no longer give that bit of wiring control over your system.)
#5, destructive usually.
#6, ranges from useless to positive.

 

[Bufo]

What is the best course of action:

1) Distract oneself with diversions?
2) Exercise, rely on endorphins and better sustained health to make the ill-feelings disappear?
3) Keep a "stiff upper lip" and keep doing what needs to be done?
4) Keep telling yourself that the feelngs are not proportional to the situation and hope they go away?
5) Embrace fully the feelings and do what the associated impulse are with a belief that they will be "out of your system?"
6) Seek professional help?
7) Something else?

1: Good for minimizing the stress for the moment.

3: Of course. Any nuisance mustn't stand in your way.

4: The best long-term remedy.

5: At least don't deny the feeling.

 

[BerberElla]

I go with number 5 most of the time, but the Brit in me also does the stiff upper lip what what.

 

[Kora]

Swallow them, bottle them up inside of your mind and act as they never, never existed. Would be 1+4+5.
Yeah well, rationalizing them it's also a choice. But they usually look too irrational to me.

 

[01011010]

Rationalize them to death.

Yes. Exercise is great as well.