Dating-Love-Relationships.com ~ Steve Nakamoto's Blog

Last week, a woman wrote to me about her heartbreaking romantic breakup. When stating why the man left the relationship, she said that it had something to do with her having a bad temper, a bad attitude, and complaining too much.

My immediate reply to her was that she suffered from an overabundance of disguised negativity. What she didn’t realize is that negativity is more than just about talking in a negative manner. Negativity may take the form of other emotions such as sadness, anger, sarcasm, criticism, fear, disappointment, judgment, worry, doubt, regret, hurt, treating other people poorly, making other people wrong, frequent emotional upsets, and excessive confrontation.

Negativity is a lot like having weeds in your backyard garden. Both are realities of life that cannot be ignored. You can’t just be positive about everything and pretend that negativity does not exist. That’s like looking into a neglected garden and chanting in denial, “There are no weeds. There are no weeds.”

Negativity has its purpose. It can bring contrast to your life. It is like the minor key in music. It brings emotion to the surface. And it is also a call to action – for you to move out of a stuck negative state and into a more empowering one.

Think of negativity as something that must be conquered or else it will conquer you. You simply learn to experience the value of negativity, but then you move forward into a more resourceful state of mind.

In order to handle negativity more effectively, here are some helpful guidelines to follow:

1. Recognize when you’re in one: It’s like getting caught swimming in a riptide. Recognize that you’re in a riptide and then swim to the side. Most people don’t recognize the situation whether it’s a riptide or negativity. Without recognition, a person simply continues doing what they are doing to their own detriment.

2. Make a radical change in your body: This means to change such things as your facial expression from a frown to a smile, breathe deep instead of shallow, stand tall instead of slumped, or look up and not down.

3. Do something else: Change your focus by staying busy, occupying your mind, changing your environment, putting on some music, or hopping into the car and going to your favorite coffeehouse for a treat.

4. Change the meaning of your experience: Ask yourself this simple question, “What could be the empowering benefit or lesson from this experience?” Think hard on this until you come up with an answer or two that is real for you.

5. Put a new label on the experience: If you’ve labeled this experience as say “catastrophic” for example, change the key word or phrase to “a learning experience.”

Remember that being characterized as a “negative person” will naturally repel people and the opportunities they would bring to you. When negativity inevitably comes into your life, be sure to convert its energy into something of value so that you can continue being a source of wisdom, love, and joy which naturally attracts the good.

THE BOTTOM LINE

Learning to recognize and handle negativity is one of the great disciplines of life. Be sure to raise your awareness around this critical topic so that you can stop it from destroying your life. Remembering that negativity often comes disguised in other emotions is a big step towards getting your life back on track and moving in the direction of the desires that are deep within your heart.

Watching women’s tennis pro, Serena Williams, embarrass herself by losing her temper at the 2009 U.S. Open in New York, reminded me of the importance of keeping your cool under pressure. Not doing so in only one occurrence, as in the case of Serena Williams, can ruin a person’s reputation despite all the apologizing in the world.

So I offer you a short course in something we commonly refer to as “anger management.” The following is designed to help you build strong relationships and preserve your positive reputation by effectively handling difficult situations involving common everyday emotional upsets.

To help you maintain a more resourceful state of mind, here are guidelines on how to lower your negative intensity and thereby gain immediate emotional control when faced with potential upsets:

1. Start from a clear position of love & respect.

If your core intention is be a more loving and respectful human being towards you and other people, this entire process of anger management will flow much easier when you begin with the right mindset.

2. If the hurtful or painful action was not intentional, then you only allow yourself to get a bit annoyed.

People sometimes do or say things that inadvertently hurt another person. Give the person a break because their actions weren’t meant to harm you. When you only let yourself to be “a bit annoyed,” you are keeping things at an appropriate low emotional level.

3. If the hurtful or painful action was not excessively, then you only allow yourself to be slightly peeved about it.

Occasionally, people will do or say things that naturally trigger pain in others. If these offenders were to realize the effects of their actions, they would cut out their unwanted behavior. Give them some slack if their painful acts are infrequent or insignificant in number. Being “slightly peeved” is another way of responding with lower emotional intensity.

4. If the hurtful or painful action was appropriate, then you only allow yourself to feel slightly below average.

Sometimes a painful action is merited because it was meant to prevent a greater or more lasting pain. In this case, the action may be warranted because in its proper context it was appropriate to perform. Again, reducing your response to that of “feeling slightly below average” helps you keep yourself in check.

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The key to this simple process is to understand that the only time to make a strong stand in your defense against emotional upsets is when three conditions are met. These conditions are that the hurtful action or what the other person says or does must be: (1) intentionally meant to harm or hurt you, (2) frequent in their occurrences, and (3) inappropriate in the context in which it is made.

If you don’t have all three of these conditions met, then lower the intensity with the right words and emotional responses and then just “let it go.” Letting go or releasing the negative energy is the icing on the cake when it comes to moving forward after a small everyday upset inevitably comes your way. Practicing this type of daily discipline will also build strong character and raise your self-esteem as a natural by-product.

Don’t let small upsets turn into big problems in your personal and professional relationships. Learn how to lower your negative emotional responses so that you can understand your situation more clearly. Don’t waste excessive energy on insignificant annoyances which inevitably occur around other people. Develop the mental discipline to handle your upsets with emotional maturity which is a major key to building strong relationships that last.

Here’s an all-too-common situation: A guy says to his girlfriend, “You look nice today.” However, to his disappointment she replies, “I don’t look so good, don’t you think I look a little bit fat and ugly?”

On the surface, you might think this woman’s response is a sign of modesty, but most experts would agree that it is more likely a sign of destructive low self-esteem.

Self-esteem reflects whether a person loves, accepts, and believes in who they are. The simplest and most powerful way to raise a person’s self-esteem is to improve that person’s way of thinking. This isn’t necessarily easy, but improved self-esteem can result by adopting these eight new thinking patterns:

1. Rediscover and reaffirm your personal strengths: Sometimes you have to take a new inventory on what you like about your looks, smile, body, sexiness, health, personality, and character strengths. For areas you don’t feel real positive about, try to be more accepting of those unique features (Example: having a nose of character).

2. Figure out the hidden strengths in your so-called weaknesses: There is always a positive in every negative if you look hard enough. For instance, you may think of yourself as stubborn, but the flip side is that you’re also persistent and dependable.

3. Make a long list of your personal breakthroughs: Think of times when you did something that you thought that never could do but managed to pull off successfully. These breakthroughs can generate an authentic source of never-ending pride in you. (Example: speaking up and presenting good points at a business meeting)

4. Avoid negative comparisons: Human beings can amplify or reduce their value by contrasting themselves either positively or negatively with others. But the most common trait of a person who has developed low self-esteem is to diminish themselves by contrasting how they don’t measure up to others.

5. Stop the critic inside of you: Some people have a nasty habit of putting themselves down often. They say damaging things to themselves like, “I’m always late. Why am I such a flake?” or “There I go again, stupid!” Get in the new habit of catching yourself saying critical things about yourself and learn to silence your inner critic.

6. Quit blaming yourself for mistakes in the past: Some things are only minimally in your control, but people who possess low self-esteem take the full blame for the resulting negative outcomes. Instead, learn to honor your efforts and give proper credit for things that you have done well or done right.

7. Have more compassion for yourself: Realize the adversity of life can make you a stronger and more understanding person. The pain that you suffered in the past can help you relate to a wider array of people. Your suffering makes you more human if you choose to channel it in that more enlightened manner.

8. Be your own cheerleader: The energy and enthusiasm of a cheerleader is necessary in order to make the radical emotional changes required to raise your self-esteem. Use this analogy to illustrate how you talk to yourself, handle adversity, and summon up the courage to pursue your interests and dreams. Being your own cheerleader isn’t silly, it’s smart and contagious.

THE BOTTOM LINE

High self-esteem is attractive while low self-esteem is not. If you want to attract, get, keep, and enjoy the love of your dreams, then it’s important to maintain a high level of self-esteem. It will keep prospective men interested, but more importantly high self-esteem will add to your own well-being.