Zoosk Dating Community

[Anne at Zoosk]

Anytime that we experience something painful in our lives our intuitive reaction is to avoid it. If a surface is hot, we instinctively remove our hand before we get burned. We might even avoid approaching a potential love interest because of the anxiety we feel about starting that initial ice breaker conversation. However psychologists are saying that some problems just “are” and trying to make them disappear might not be the answer.

I feel confident saying most of us try to avoid pain when it comes our way. Our natural response to any kind of unpleasant thought or feeling is to resist even having those thoughts or feelings to begin with. For example, you’ve just broken up with someone. The thoughts and feelings you are faced with are by no means happy ones. In fact, you’d like to avoid having them altogether. So you stop going to the bar where you first met. You stop eating chicken parmesan, because it was your lost lover’s favorite dish. It hurts to be reminded, so you take a small detour when these things cross your path. If you are honest with yourself, you know that many times negative situations and the negative feelings they bring about cannot be avoided.

Nobody enjoys feelings of loneliness, but what do you do about it? You could try to fight the feelings. You could do whatever it takes to make them go away. These feelings are coming from somewhere though. So if you try to make them go away, you might just be providing yourself with a momentary distraction. It feels good and it helps for a while, but the root of it is still there.

What most people don’t realize is that we have primary and secondary emotions. I’ll use an example to illustrate what these are. Let’s say you have a million things to do and you are getting pretty stressed out about it. That’s the primary emotion. The secondary emotion would be that now you are getting upset because you hate feeling stressed out. But by focusing on the painful part of the situation, your stress level, it prolongs the stress.

What if, brace yourselves now, you just accepted the primary emotion for what it is? If you’ve broken up with someone your primary emotion might be some form of heartache. It’s normal to have feelings of loneliness, sadness, or longing, but you tell yourself you need to make those feelings go away. This puts all of the focus on the negative feelings. Why not just accept them, and remind yourself that these feelings are a normal and natural part of life? Everyone experiences similar ups and downs at some point and, as strange as it may sound, it’s ok to feel that way.

This doesn’t mean that you have to like what is happening, and it doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t be looking for ways to improve the current situation and move past it. It means that you have control of the impact that this emotion is going to have on your life. You can isolate it for what it is. Kabat-Zinn is a scientist, author, and meditation thought leader, who teaches that when you are mindful of these feelings, you can label them for what they are, and then focus your energy on other things. It’s a practice of identifying the negative situation, but ending your emotional involvement with it there. After all these are just thoughts and they don’t need to dictate your next move.

My friends, I’m no moth. I see the flame for what it is. I can’t change it. I can’t make it go away, but I won’t get burned.

[reana09]

Yes your absolutely right about this. Accepting the fact that those feelings do occur in life, instead see it as it's the end of your existence or something. It's true some people feel once they have been broken up for a certain reason, they do not want to re-capture the moments they went through with their ex. I'll be honest I did it, I did not listen to certain songs because it reminded me of my ex lol but I grew up and moved on...now I'll listen to them like they are brand new to me or something.

Just like how I see it and I'm sure others do too, life goes on...it will force you to move on actually. Accept it and learn from what was done, and do not let those negative feelings affect the rest of your life. Life is more important than the feeling of being alone or just got dumped. Those feelings come with love and come with life lessons you know?

This was nice helpful advice, thanks for posting

[JRM]

"Our natural response to any kind of unpleasant thought or feeling is to resist even having those thoughts or feelings to begin with"

hmmmm maybe some but not all, some people wallow in it.

[Louie]

Nothing happens if you don't try....you stay stuck in one place....But it's up to you to go the direction that you want, forwards, backwards, to the lert, to the right.....It's up to you to make that motion....Just have to get over your fears is all, or stay there until you overcome them, or make peace with that apprehension, or distraught feelings... after that, just ge yourself whether you want to make that leap of blind faith or just chill with the singleness that you have...me I'm ready to take that leap!

[Pspsup]

Nice post Anne, and well researched. one small important omission. like a "moth we are DRAWN to the flame" why is that after we are told don't touch its hot, we touch not once but again and again.

[Jason]

Well as far as relationships and breakups go, yes, it is emotional and stressful of the thought of losing "your everything." But the bigger picture is, how can we learn from this experience and grow from it. Sometimes losing the one you love can be a positive. When looking back, you can possibly see the mistakes that were made in the relationship on both sides. For example, you can learn what you can put up with or tolerate in a relationship, and then look to yourself and figure out what you can do as a person to improve the next meaningful relationship to make it better. Basically, what I am saying is simple. Make a negative into a positive. We don't have to live our lives being bitter at the other person for the relationship not working even though it may still hurt. We need to grow as an individual, stay positive, learn from our mistakes, and use these tools to better our relationships in the future!

[VMcD]

Much of what was said here is the basis of something called Reality Therapy. Which states our first reaction to any given situation is involuntary. While our second reaction is voluntary.

In the end it is a behavior modification tool we can all use in order to take control of every situation in our lives and promote a feeling of empowerment and control, no matter the situation. As Anne stated, we can not run from our initial reactions to emotional stresses, however we can control what we do with them and how we let them affect us.

One analogy we used in RT was this.

Let's say you are forced to drive a long distance and have no choice.

Yet yo are given two choices on how to get there. One road is full of pot holes and bumps, while the other is smooth and has great scenery Since you have to drive any way, choose the road that is more pleasant. In making that choice you will arrive at your destination in a much better frame of mind.

By taking control not only do you get over set backs much faster, but you also grow and learn from them.
Great post Anne.

Hang Loose and Stay FIt

V

[Queen]

lovely

[T_N_T]

Very nice.

[Davidlevack]

But seeing the situation as one of hazardous vs. charmed... isn't that a bad way to go about it too?

Not exactly on topic, but something I notice a lot, people tend to speak of other peoples actions as if the other person intended to do a truly malicious or inherently evil act towards them... when in all likelihood it was something in their rational best interest (which doesn't usually account for other peoples feelings.)