You had a great day spending time with your friends and family but you’re still feeling sad? Are you berating yourself for feeling sad even when you had no reason? Well, you need to stop!
We all feel sad sometimes – without a reason – just like you would feel happy, angry, proud, or guilty. Emotions come in all shapes and sizes and they are nearly unavoidable. Emotions bring feelings and feelings can change, without warning.
Sometimes we can feel joyous, and other times we can feel sad. It’s OK. After all, feelings and emotions are part of our lives and more important – wellness.
Probably not one of our favorite emotions, sadness is still an important emotion. While it can be distressing and quite uncomfortable to experience sadness, it can have some benefits. People have labeled sadness as a negative emotion and because of the labeling, we find avoiding sadness common.
I mean, when I’m feeling sad, I love to distract myself by isolating myself with my music playlist or binge-eating, even when I’m not that hungry. These unhealthy distractions are only to keep me from avoiding feeling sad.
Other times, when you’re feeling sad, you may even lash out at your loved ones just to avoid the emotion. Avoiding feeling sad can be accompanied by toxic positivity or an occurrence where you avoid all difficult emotions and acknowledge only the positive ones. While temporarily, they may bring relief, in the long run, they can take a heavy emotional toll.
Feeling Sad? What It Means
Sadness is often accompanied by other emotions including anger, stress, grief, or anxiety. Sometimes, when the feelings of sadness are too strong, they can be mistaken for depression. In other cases, feeling sad can be an underlying symptom of mental health conditions.
So when you feel sad, what does it mean? When you feel sad, you may experience a stomach ache, a heaviness in your chest, or may struggle with getting a good night’s sleep. Emotionally, when you feel sad, you may want to cry, lash out at someone, isolate yourself, or avoid talking to your loved ones.
Identifying your sadness and knowing that it’s OK to be sad can be a good sign for your overall wellness.
Reasons Why Feeling Sad Is OK
When you know that it’s OK to be sad, you don’t allow yourself to wallow in your misery and self-pity, instead, you choose to accept your emotions and allow yourself to process them as they are.
Other reasons why feeling sad is OK can include;
1. It Helps You Increase Connection
One benefit of feeling sad or expressing sadness is that it can help increase empathy and encourage others to be compassionate towards you. Expressing sadness can also increase the shared sense of belonging and can bring communities together to express a single emotion.
2. It Helps You Process Complex Feelings
When you feel the urge to isolate yourself when you feel sad, it means that you are building a protective barrier to keep you safe when you’re most vulnerable. Letting yourself feel sad can help your mind and body to process complex emotions and space to process those emotions freely.
3. It Helps You Grieve
When grieving the loss of a loved one, friend, or even a pet, feeling sad is normal and a natural process. When you feel sad, it can help you process your grief and reflect on your emotions. Embracing sadness and crying can also help others near you understand that you’re processing grief and can encourage them to be empathetic towards you.
4. It Helps You Move Forward
Expressing sadness can also help understand and respond to your thoughts and process your feelings. When you ruminate on the same thought over and over, it can be unhealthy for you but when this is accompanied by sadness, it can help you move forward and come to terms with what you’ve experienced.
5. It Helps Expand Your Self-Awareness
Sadness is often a natural response to feelings of failure, loss, and guilt but it’s also a wonderful tool to expand your awareness and self-knowledge. It can help you identify your values, goals, the capacity to love, dependence on others, and more.
6. It Helps You Identify What’s Wrong
When you feel sad, it can also be a sign of something wrong in your life. For example, you may feel sad knowing that your relationship isn’t working out or that you’re experiencing burnout at your job. This emotion can help identify what’s wrong in your life and to let you know that it’s time to change some things.
Reasons You May Be Feeling Sad –
You may be struggling at home, school, or the workplace
You may have recently moved to another city, town, or country
You may have a loved one recently
You are ill or caring for someone who’s not well
You may be experiencing hormonal changes (puberty, menopause, pregnancy, etc)
You may be experiencing changes in your thinking processes
Tips To Feel Sad Without Feeling Overwhelmed
It can become too easy (and normal) to let your sadness overwhelm your senses and make you lose yourself in the emotion. Here are some tips to help you embrace sadness without feeling overwhelmed;
1. Journaling Can Help
Writing your feelings in a journal can help you understand why you’re feeling the way you do and how you can manage the emotion without letting it rule your mind. Journaling is one of the most effective ways to process negative emotions and get in touch with the root cause of such emotions.
2. Practicing Self-Compassion
Self-compassion is a great tool to help you handle the uncomfortable feelings that come with sadness. Try practicing self-compassion techniques and understand that sadness is only temporary and like every other emotion, it will soon pass.
3. Try Meditation
Meditation is another best practice to deal with sadness. You can focus on acknowledging your sadness and replace it with something positive during meditation. Meditation can also help you calm down when feeling sad begins to overwhelm you. You can try mindfulness meditation, Loving-kindness meditation, body scan meditation, and more to ease the feeling of sadness.
4. Talk About Your Feelings
One of the most effective ways to process emotions like sadness is to talk about your feelings with your support system or a professional mental health counselor. Talking about your feelings can also make you feel less alone in your struggles. Talking your feelings out can help you find the cause and how to change the situation.
When Sadness Becomes Persistent?
Feeling sad is not about feeling depressed. But when sadness lingers and begins to affect your daily life then it may be of concern. The symptoms of sadness and depression are different and sadness can be a symptom of depression.
Let’s look at some of the symptoms of sadness and depression:
Symptoms Of Sadness
Symptoms Of Depression
The emotions you feel are not constant
The feelings last longer than two weeks
The feelings are interrupted with laughter and happiness. Does not linger
It can lead to significant weight and sleep changes
It can cause ruminating thoughts but not for long
It can disrupt your daily life
If you’re feeling depressed, then it is strongly recommended that you speak to a mental health professional for a diagnosis and get the right treatment.
Feeling sad can be a great way to understand your emotional processing better. Embracing sadness can also help you process complex emotions, connect with others, and get to accept your life changes better.
If you’d like to connect with a professional, you can sign up with BetterHelp by clicking the link below. Or you can write to us at info@calmsage.com for more.
You can share your thoughts in the comments below and let us know what you think of the benefits of feeling sad. Remember, it’s OK to feel sad so don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.
Take Care!
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