Dealing with emotional stress

To clarify: No one can break your heart. That’s my starting point and it’s the only honest point of self empowerment. No one breaks our hearts, but rather, we allow our hearts to break. More importantly and more often that not, we play a majour part in breaking our own hearts.

This does not mean that there aren’t individuals who willingly – and enjoyably - inflict pain on others. Like the undeniable existence of the chickadee, there too is the undeniable existence of the Meanies who enjoy the trauma and hurt they cause others.

Most individuals we come in contact with are, simply put: ‘Goodies’. I’m sure that if they were edible, they would be sweet and soft and buttery. But they’re people and so I we hesitate to bite them; should they find me us trying to eat their elbow, they may be mislead into thinking I we are a little weird.

I think there’s much to be said in the way we choose to approach the particular subject of emotional stress or pain. Here are the four recommendations I have to offer…

First: Ring up your 4 best friends and cry on the phone without saying a word. I know that no one told you this, but this is really what friends are for. That and for buying you birthday gifts. Maybe in the shape of Crack. Ultimately, no one wants to cry alone and so it’s best to ring The Girls and weep. The occasional moan is also highly recommended. By the end of the day, your eyes will be a beautiful shade of red – were they rouge, they would be sold out – and they will be super tiny and you may even have the appearance of a different ethnicity which is always fun. Even cooler is that your hair will be extra frizzy; something you can’t buy in a bottle. Your sinuses will be clear and you will have a new found respect for the capacity of your mobile to function while drowned in tears.

Second: Accept and live the Regular Pain that comes with any sort of mourning. No matter the trauma, allow yourselves to mourn for three days and wear white, or if white doesn’t suit you, make certain to wear bright colours that reflect sunshine. Ultimately, people drop dead and we can get over it; surely we can get over anything else that’s thrown our way, n’est pas?

Avoid and do not let entry into your hearts and minds the self-inflicted Super Dooper Pain. We like to self-pity because self-help books and therapists and today’s values teach us that it’s okay to self-pity. It may even make us pretty. Frankly, there's nothing sexy about self-pity and it offers no self empowerment and no ability for movement, growth or self realization. When you ‘oh woe is me’ your life away, you’re placing yourself in a position of spiritual and emotional paralysis and stagnation. Stop it. Cut it out. Oh woe is you is unacceptable. It’s meaningless and detrimental to your beautiful self.

If you really must, then do it for no more than three days (I'm not kidding!). Then get out and go for a long walk and brush it off. If you have a friend who is Oh woe is her/he-ing, let them mourn for no longer than three days and then pull them out of their funk and force them to take a walk. Take them to a park, to a café, a restaurant, a movie…whatever. Don’t let them sit at home in isolation unless you want them to fall into a state of depression. Seriously, yo, this is not a joke.

Third: Self empower your a**. No one caused you heartache. Someone may have contributed to your sadness, but that’s it. Look at you; look at your actions and ask yourself what steps you took to bring this home to you. When you’ve seen that, then you can really work to dig yourself out from the hole in which you sit.

To me – because this is my blog - self empowerment means that I never stand by and let things ‘just happen’. I don’t believe in that sort of nonsense. If you’re the sort of individual who willingly and passively stands by and lets someone or something run amuck with your life, then you need to refocus and get perspective where you had none. Immediately. Blaming others for the circumstance of your life is a weakness. It’s a copout and a cheapening of who you are; even worse, it’s your perfect excuse to never grow.

My friend Al recently told me that when people invoke the “but I love him/her” clause, it causes a break in the conversation. He's absolutely correct; it serves as an excuse to justify misbehaviour and all emotional self-mutilation which ensues.

Before you next find yourself sobbing and blowing your nose at an unprecedented rate while declaring “but I love him/her”, please make certain to remove that statement and replay the conversation. This exercise will force you to see whether or not the actions are acceptable on their own merit. Don’t invoke the “but I love him/her” clause because it won’t do sh*t but turn you into a slave to your emotions. When all is said and done, you want to rule your emotions, becoming the master of your emotional domain, and not vice versa. This is what it means to have an elevated character and it is to this elevated character that each and every one of us should aim.

I will be the first to admit that I'm not there yet. I don't know if I ever will be, but I owe it to myself and to my heart to aim higher than my current station.

From this vantage point you can now open your eyes to your own actions. You’re at an impasse here and you can either choose to bemoan your state or to rectify it in no uncertain terms. If you choose the latter, then carefully choose the materials you will use to build who you are as an individual. The materials you use should be materials that will, as already mentioned above, elevate you instead of allowing you to regress.

Just remember; we can always ask more from ourselves and we can always deliver if we so choose. Nothing can come to fruition unless we want it to, and the only way to want something is to want it with an unshakeable heart filled with conviction.

Fourth: Remember that God never gives us more than we can handle…and the greater the challenge, the luckier we are. The greater the hurdle, the stronger we become. What may feel like a disaster today will be the hope that you use and on which you build your future.

Please note: None of this is meant to belittle the pain and trauma caused by the a**hole Meanie cheating on their partners and children.