How do you deal with negative experiences and still manage to stay positive?

Answer 1

Negative experiences happen all the time. Life hits us in the head constantly. What counts is the attitude. How do we react when faced with those experiences. We have many choices: Feel angry, have self-pity, get depressed, turn to drugs and alcohol... But nothing will change the fact that we will have to go through the pain. Better be honest with ourselves and our limits. We should do our best not to be too touched by those situations and look at it from the outside like a spectator. So that we can thing rationally.
Everything passes. I have gone through a lot in my life. I know that at times I thought that I could not take it anymore. Somehow I was given the strength to go on. Now I look back and think that I would not change anything about my life. I cherish every scar on my heart because it has made me the person that I am. More mature, stronger and more understanding of other people's suffering. So the only way to stay positive is to know that the pain will pass and it can later turn into a positive experience. The more you overcome challenges and the more faith you will have the strength to overcome another challenge and so on. This is the only way I somehow am able to deal with the negative.

Answer 2

All I can tell you is how I do it...

I have have had my share of 'negative' experiences. When they happen, sometimes it is difficult to stay positive, especially right at the moment they happen, especially if in the thick of the emotional impact. But, given the opportunity to sit and think about it, I try to see where things are going from that experience. I ask myself questions:

1. Is it the end of the world?
2. Will I recover from it?
3. Have I learned something from it?
4. Where will I go now? What will I do now?

I suppose staying positive means looking for the positives in an experience. Now, I'm not saying that all experiences can have positives, but many can. I was once asked to come up with a list of things that I was thankful for, and this was during a time when I was extremely depressed and nothing seemed to have any positive aspect.

One of my answers was (and I surprised myself even) that despite having lost someone I loved very much that I felt blessed to have had so many years that I got to spend with them. This was the positive from an extremely negative experience.

I think being positive about the bad things can be a 'mindset' - it's all in how you approach it. You have to dig deep to get the answers.

Answer 3

I first ask myself- DID THIS KILL ME- no
In the big scheme of life will I even remember this tomorrow/next week or next year? probably not
Then I thank GOD for the positive.

For example- last night my truck broke down 1/2 mile from home. I was not injured- I was not in a rough neighborhood- i had a cell phone and was able to call for help- I have friends that were able to come and take me to get a van I am borrowing from my boss until my truck can be fixed.
Now if I looked at all that went wrong it would drive me crazy but instead I am focusing on the positive things and being thankful that for them.

You get out of life what you put into it and the same goes for our attitude- if we fill our heads with the negative then we have a negative experience and if we focus on the positive then we will have a positive experience even when things go wrong.

Answer 4

Don't dwell on it. Overcome negatives with positives.

First, make sure you know something that you want to achieve in your life, and focus on that. If an obstacle comes up tell yourself, okay, so now I'll also overcome that obstacle in the course of achieving my goal.

Second, think about others around your and their needs, finding ways to help. Take the focus off yourself and your life sometimes.

Third, get the right perspective on your life and experiences. In The Once and Future King, by T.H. White (the book Camelot, the musical was based on) there is a helpful parable. A traveling rabbi stays with a rich man one night who treats him shabbily, and in the morning pays to have the wall around his house repaired. The next night he stays with a poor man, who treats him like royalty, and in the morning the only sheep the poor man owns is dead. The rabbi's disciple complains that God has been unfair. The rabbi points out that the disciple doesn't have God's perspective. There was a pot of gold hidden in the hole in the rich man's wall, which was covered back up, and the poor man was supposed to lose his son, but instead only his sheep died as a repayment for his kindness to the rabbi. The moral: make sure you know the purpose of events in your life before you view them as negative.

The worst experience I had in my life made me a much better husband.

Answer 5

I guess you haven't been able to since you asked this 4 months ago.............?

I have a feeling that you are dwelling on whatever this negative experience(s) is. As long as you rent it room in your head, you are going to think of nothing else and you will be miserable.

Remember, things change from one moment to the next. Don't like theway you feel right now, then wait 5 minutes and it WILL change. Whenever those thoughts creep in, remember that. You son't feel this bad 5 minutes from now. And move on. Do something!

Answer 6

I wouldn't say that being positive is always possible. But what gets me through rough times is remembering what my Dad told me when I was a kid. He said "this too shall pass". It is very easy to get stuck in the negative and not look past it. We are human. It is true that "this too shall pass". Or none of us would be functioning at all! Right? Right. Things change. Time doesn't stand still.

Answer 7

You have to try to change your way of thinking. I constantly look at things on the negative side, but I always try to stop myself from doing that and see all the good things around me. Being negative really brings your energy down and people don't want to be around you. A lot of people will look up to you when they see you can remain positive and have good energy to be around.

Smoking weed dosn't hurt either!

Answer 8

What I do, and hopefully it will help you too is focus on spirituality it doesn't have to be God. Keep in mind that there is a reason for everything and a purpose for us all. This helped me get through the beginning of healing from some heartwrenching trauma.

Answer 9

The best way i do it is move on and try to think positive by listing to music and just hanging out with friends and discusing the sadness or pain i feel inside, or just draw and express my thoghts.

Answer 10

if your general make up is positive you could get occasionally slammed with negative` ones but your personality wont change.