Have there been times you have told yourself, “I should not be so______ (anxious, afraid, angry, sad, etc.) in this situation”? Probably so, but your self-criticism misses the point that you are experiencing an emotion and you need to do—as in take action—something about it. Strong emotions can be crippling and a major cause of avoiding challenges in your life. You can, however, learn to put those emotions to good use.
Doesn’t it make sense that your emotions are quite natural? For instance, isn’t it normal to be anxious about being evaluated, grief-stricken when losing a loved one, uneasy when confronting strangers, or sad after being rejected? Of course it’s natural. Why, then, do you want to rid yourself of the emotion? The answer is, because you see the emotion as the problem. But, the problem is not the emotion; the problem is how you cope with the expression of the emotion. Emotional states can be used to your advantage. For example, anxiety can motivate you to prepare for tests and emergencies, bring you closer to significant others, encourage you to confront criticism, work harder to improve performance, and a host of other effective actions. Anxiety does not have to be your enemy.
The same can be said about other emotions. How about intense grief after the loss of a loved one? Depending on the circumstances of the death, you can become quite debilitated as a result of grief. Usually, however, intense grief signals how important others were to you, and how much they taught you about living. Wouldn’t the best way to honor their memory be to demonstrate that they left you with an inner strength that allows you to remember them in positive ways? So, seek out those positives that will allow you to honor them: share with others what they taught you; establish a memorial to them; write about them; find their influence manifest in your life.
You can consciously and deliberately redirect emotional states that energize negative actions into producing positive actions. Doing so will help you attain better control of your thoughts and emotions, and will help you cope better and grow when confronted with the distress of emotional upheaval.
Psychology and Stress 