Negative Positivity

Good vibes only stickers

I’ve always liked stickers, to use while journaling, writing thoughts, to attach on my notebook etc., and it’s something I regularly do, in fact, I can say I have a pretty good sticker collection collected over the years; and I know it may seem something very childish to someone but it helps me to confirm how I feel that day, or what I need, in a sense it’s a little trick I use to enter on a calm mental state, attach stickers is a way to look at the problems and don’t fear them.

Using stickers is a ritual I do every day, on bad and good days, whatever I’m writing I like to use one at least and, choosing my sticker for the day I realised I only found very positive stickers; don’t get me wrong I love some good happy shiny sticker with positive quotes but let’s being honest, no-one is always, always, happy!

It may sounds silly but if you reflect about it I can’t have stickers that match my emotional status on sad or not-so-bright days, and this made me think: why can’t I have a sad sticker? Is it so wrong to express when I’m sad? When we write on a journal what we write is extremely personal and private, no one is watching us or reading our paper so why can’t we be honest with ourself and say ‘Today I’m sad and this is my grey raining and crying cloud sticker’? 

Why should I force myself to smile and stay positive if I don’t feel to?

Lately I have the general impression that people lie and force themselves to look happy even if they’re not; on every kind of environment there is always this false happy look, if we don’t look sad we wont be sad anymore kinda thing, but is doesn’t work like this! We can’t ignore our negative feelings, if we feel sad we should try to understand why, what makes us feel that way. Didn’t we learn anything from Inside Out? We keep saying ‘Good vibes only! Stay positive! Make today count! Positive thoughts Positive life! Even on days when we don’t quite feel to stay positive, we often deny our negative feelings as a defence mechanism, which means ignoring the reality of a situation to avoid anxiety, sadness, anger etc.. When we deny ( a certain situation or feeling) it can mean we struggle to accept something that for us is stressful or overwhelming and, although this may be successful in the short term it can be harmful in the long term, it may keeps us away from the change that we need, it can stop us from accepting help or asking it.

According to Freud denial or abnegation is a pshycological defence mechanism where a person is faced with a fact that is too uncomfortable to accept and rejects it instead, insisting that it is not true, it is the refusal that the reality is that way. Defence mechanisms protect the ego against unwanted thoughts, guilt and anxiety. If you feel sad, angry, anxious or uncomfortable on a particular situation or talking about a specific topic, then you may deny reality (sometimes our friends and family may notice our avoidance before us).

I know, suffer sucks, no one want to be sad or angry or anxious, but it can be necessary to go through these for our personal growth.

First thing to do: accept your feelings. It’s ok to cry, to scream, or eat and entire pack of ice cream if we feel overwhelmed, it’s completely normal not being happy all the time, everyone can have a bad day or period, this doesn’t make us weak.

One small step at the time, you don’t have to spill the bean of your emotional luggage all at once, proceed by steps instead and work on one problem per time, I am a huge fun of making lists!

I find writing very helpful when I feel having too many thoughts on my mind, it gives me the time to reflect at my own pace and discovery my inner self.

Don’t judge your emotions, many have been grown by generations that were not used to reflect on how they felt but this doesn’t mean that we have to follow the same path, take the necessary time to discover yourself, have a healthy cry and use that sad or angry sticker.

I’m not writing this because I wanna teach something, I’m probably the last person who can do that! But as I said, writing helps me when I have too many feelings intertwining and all of this is also a memento for me for every time I will feel that life is becoming too much and I need to take five minutes for myself, sit down, write and choose my stickers.