How To Deal With Negativity

There can be a lot of negativity that we get exposed to throughout the day. A stranger flips us off as we are commuting to work, and we watch ugly human behaviors that show up on our phone scrolling. The key is to not dwell on the negative behaviors of others and redirect our focus on the "positive" events around us.

(Please note, this is a talk, not a guided meditation.)

Transcript

Welcome to the Happiness Podcast.

I'm Dr.

Robert Puff.

Sometimes there could be a lot of negativity in our world.

If we're looking for it,

We can even find more.

And sadly,

These days because of our phones,

Sometimes when people are exposed to negative events,

They pull out their phones,

Take pictures of it,

And then post the videos on the internet so everyone can see all over the world.

It's very easy to be exposed to negativity if we're not careful.

And I want to talk today about being careful because negative energy,

Negative emotions,

Negativity will impact us.

We can't blindly watch negative events and not be affected by them.

Think of it this way.

Let's say you like to swim as I do,

And I swim pretty often.

If I went to my pool in the morning and it's been cleaned,

They have chlorine,

And everything about is just in good shape,

I'm going to be able to swim in that pool and come out exactly like I went in the pool.

But if that pool hasn't been maintained,

It now has fungus,

It now has bacteria,

It now has all types of things growing in it that are not good for me,

If I swim in that pool,

I'm gonna come out infected by some of those diseases and it could negatively impact me.

So first off,

Why would we even expose ourselves to just negativity if we know at some level there's going to be adverse effects to that exposure?

Why would we even do that?

Well the first thing is,

It is interesting.

What I mean by that is,

It stimulates our perception and we say,

Oh what is that?

What's going on here?

That's why we like movies and television.

They stimulate us and make us curious.

They make us see things that we may never see unless we were exposed to it.

And that exposure creates curiosity.

I mean we're out and about and we hear a big bang,

Most of us are going to look and run towards that event where the noise came from to see what happened.

We as humans are curious.

But our curiosity can get us in trouble.

And a lot of times it isn't curiosity,

It's more boredom.

We turn towards things that are negative because we're bored.

I remember hearing a story about a woman once who had been married to an alcoholic and after she divorced him because he was very abusive and it was just an awful situation because of the negativity.

Then when she actually met a guy who was reliable,

Who didn't drink,

Showed up on time and was kind towards her,

She in quotes found it boring.

After a while she did get used to it of course and stayed with him.

But initially that consistency,

That everything going well,

That positivity,

She experienced as boredom.

Now when that negativity is aimed at us,

We don't like it of course.

But there is a sense of curiosity.

There is a sense of oh what is this?

And we have to be careful about that because we can't expose ourselves to things without being affected by them.

Getting back to my pool analogy,

We can't swim in a really dirty disgusting pool without coming out being affected by the water.

It's the same way with negativity.

If we expose ourselves to things that are negative,

Whether we choose them or we're just exposed to them,

We need to make sure as quickly as possible we rinse ourself off from that negativity and we stop exposing ourselves to that negativity.

Think of it like this,

When we eat something that's rotten or not good for us,

We're gonna get sick.

We're either gonna get diarrhea,

We're gonna have to throw up,

Or we're just gonna have to do something to get rid of that contaminated food and our body responds to that contamination.

But if that's the only thing we have to eat to keep ourselves alive and we keep eating it,

We're not gonna do well.

We're gonna get sick,

We're gonna get diseases and pretty soon it will ultimately kill us.

Well negativity is like that.

Of course it moves much slower in the sense it's not gonna kill us overnight.

But being exposed to it is like eating rotten food.

It may initially taste good because it's covered in all these great sauces,

But if the meat is spoiled we're gonna get sick no matter how good it tastes.

But here it's a little tricky because negativity has two parts to it.

One is when it's directed at us.

Almost all of us hate that.

When we're around some negativity and it's directed at us,

None of us for the most part like that.

Or even when we're in public and we see someone misabusing another person.

I think most of us feel very uncomfortable watching that interaction.

We may pull out our phones to record it,

But we're not liking what we're seeing and may even do something to stop it.

But unfortunately these days it's very easy to expose ourselves to negativity from the comforts of our own home.

Because of our phones,

Because of movies,

Because of television,

We can be exposed to incredibly horrific things that we may at one level think don't matter at all.

But perhaps today after listening to this talk we might reflect on,

Hmm I wonder if this is negatively impacting me.

Because negativity again is like swimming in a dirty pool.

It's hard to walk away from it without being affected by it.

A lot of times we don't notice negativity because we're used to it.

We have such exposure to it on an excessive level that being around non-negativity,

As I said earlier,

Can be boring or just not very interesting.

And we need that stimulation in order to entice us,

To get us interested.

So we watch things or we get exposure to negativity and we don't even notice how it's impacting us.

That's where we have to be careful.

We are creatures of habit.

We're conditioned beings.

And if our conditioning is such that now we're used to being around negativity and think it's the norm,

Then we're gonna have problems.

We have a tendency to really get used to things whether they're good or bad.

So if we are interested in having a life that's going better,

That is filled with more happiness and joy,

Then it probably makes sense that we ought to expose ourselves to things that are more positive,

Uplifting.

Obviously if you're living in a war zone it's much harder to find happiness than if you have a mountain retreat where it's peaceful and tranquil.

Those are two very different experiences.

One being very negative,

The other being very positive.

And of course the person in the mountain retreat probably has a better chance of finding happiness and joy in their life than someone living in a war zone where they're just seeing horrific acts of mayhem occurring regularly in their lives.

So if we want to be happy and that's important to us,

Then we have to realize that everything we expose ourselves to matters.

And if we're living in a hostile environment where there's a lot of dark things going on,

It's gonna impact us.

But I think the thing that catches us is we don't realize it's the choices that we're making because we often choose to expose ourselves to very negative,

Horrific acts through what we watch on the media.

So if you agree with me that negativity is like swimming in a dirty pool,

It's gonna impact us.

Then let's talk about one,

How to stay away from those pools.

And two,

If we do get exposed to them,

How do we rinse ourselves off as quickly as possible.

So the first thing is let's stop exposing ourselves to negativity through the internet,

Through movies that we go to,

Through things that really are not feeding our soul.

So I can't even tell you the number of times I've watched a new series,

A new movie,

Or a YouTube video that I start watching and I'm like,

Ugh,

I turned it off.

I'd stop watching it.

I just can't get into the series or in the movie because of the negativity that's being displayed.

If we make the choice,

Then we have to walk away from it.

Now remember,

There's part of it that's interesting,

That's enticing.

So we'll be like walking away from dessert.

I mean desserts can be good,

But they're not very good for us.

It's like that with negativity.

It can be interesting.

That's why all the different things out there use it in their media because it works.

It draws people in.

But what draws us in doesn't mean it's good for us.

I mean drugs draw people in.

That's why people sell them.

But they're definitely not good for us.

So it is a choice not to want to be around negativity.

We have to choose to be engaged with things that are uplifting for our soul,

That are feeding our soul,

And stay away from things that are negative.

They're just not good for us.

Now in relationships,

It's the same way.

If we're in a caustic relationship,

Whether it's a friendship or a family relationship or even a marital relationship,

We have to decide,

Is the negativity that I'm being exposed to good for me?

And if not,

Then we have to talk about setting boundaries,

Walking away from that negativity.

If our partner is angry at us,

Say no I'm not gonna engage with this because this is a negative encounter and I choose to walk away.

It's not that we can't have conversations with people.

Of course we can.

But we can do it in a polite,

Kind manner.

We don't have to engage in negativity if someone else wants to go there.

We can just say no this is not going the way that I like.

I'm gonna walk away from this right now.

They may get angry.

They may get more upset.

But if we leave this situation,

If we walk away from the negativity,

Then we're gonna do better.

But at a deeper level,

What we have to do is we have to be careful not to dwell on negative experiences when we are exposed to them.

Because sooner or later we're gonna be exposed to something negative.

All of us are,

Whether we choose it or not.

When that happens,

We have to let it go.

There's a tendency to ruminate over things over and over again when something negative happens.

We just replay it in our minds repeatedly and that's what keeps us stuck.

It's like fueling the negative pool.

It's like jumping into a dark dirty pool and then jumping in again to rinse it off and jumping in again to rinse it off.

It's not gonna rinse it off.

It's gonna make it worse.

So here's a technique that I like that can be very helpful with how to avoid and how to deal with negativity.

A friend of mine has an allergic reaction to smoke,

Cigarette smoke.

So anytime she's around it,

She gets a migraine headache.

So she avoids it very much in her life because it causes such damage when she's around it.

So what if you began to start developing an allergic reaction towards anything negative or negative energy?

So the first thing you're gonna do is you're not gonna go seeking it out because you know you have an allergic reaction to it.

So why would you seek it out?

You wouldn't if you like smoking a cigarette.

If you're allergic to them,

You just wouldn't.

But the second thing is you can't always control when people are gonna be negative around you like you can't control when people are smoking around you.

So when they are,

What would you do?

You would leave.

So the same way in this situation because you're developing an allergic reaction towards negativity when you're around it,

You smell that negativity and you say,

Oh I need to remove myself from this situation.

You don't attack it.

You don't attack someone who's smoking.

You just remove yourself from that person.

So it's the same way with negativity.

When you're exposed to it,

You don't attack the person that's being negative.

You just remove yourself from that negative person.

And lastly,

When you are exposed to something negative,

It isn't good to go over it in your mind over and over again.

That'd be like you walking into a room where someone's smoking and then you want to go in there and smell the smoke again.

You wouldn't do that.

Instead you get outside,

Breathe some fresh air in and let your mind clear and your lungs clear.

It's the same way when we're exposed to negativity.

Remove yourself from the situation and surround yourself with places that are positive,

Uplifting,

Loving and kind.

And so if you can probably tell,

This is gonna affect the type of relationships we have.

If we have a friend or a family member who is perhaps often negative,

Maybe not towards us,

But is a negative person,

We may need to remove ourselves from them when they're going down that path of negativity and get some fresh air.

But it also means setting good boundaries across the board and being careful not to expose ourselves to things that are really bad for us.

Because now we're allergic to negativity.

If we develop this technique,

Then we'll find that what we're attracted towards are positive,

Uplifting things.

And we seek them out.

We look for them.

We engage with them.

And we participate in them.

We create them with other people.

So the key here is not to dwell on the negative behaviors of others and instead redirect our focus on the positive events all around us.

Because there are always things that are positive,

Uplifting and just good for our soul.

If we expose ourselves to negative things,

They're just gonna impact us.

It's like swimming in that dirty water.

It's not good for us.

And in conclusion,

Can you imagine if we really made the effort to just be around positivity,

How it would impact us in a good way?

What I found that people's lives that are going well,

That is what they do.

They themselves are positive.

Their friends are uplifting and supportive.

And they're careful about who they expose themselves to and what they see.

We can all do this.

It does take work.

It does take efforts.

But the rewards are incredible.

So may we all be careful with negativity.

Make sure we stay away from it as much as possible.

And really surround ourselves with a lot of positive,

Uplifting experiences,

People and thoughts.

Thank you for joining me on the Happiness Podcast.

Until next time,

Accept what is,

Love what is.

Reviews

Always wonderful! Thanks

I'm glad I found this talk and will think how to apply it in my life.

Excellent advice. Thanks it

Excellent!

It was helpful to think the negativity as allergen. I tell myself that until the idea becomes part of me. I now understand when a meditation instructor says exhale what is not good for you. Thank you for helping me deepen the understanding.

Excellent advice!

this is good basic stuff. Love the analogies. What do you do If you have a negative family member you can’t get away from or have to be around on a regular basis?

Thank you 🙏