The first step to manage your emotions is to accept them.
Accepting means that you practice allowing your feelings to be what they are without judging them or trying to change them.
It involves being aware of your emotions and accepting that these feelings exist without trying to suppress or push them away.
Certainly,
No one wants to walk around feeling emotional pain all the time,
But when you reject your emotions,
You may actually make things worse.
Emotions serve a variety of purposes,
Including providing helpful information about the world.
This means that getting rid or pushing away emotions is not the best idea.
You are ignoring the information that the emotions is giving you.
An alternative to pushing away or stifling your emotions is learning to accept your emotional experiences.
Accepting means that you practice allowing your emotions to be what they are without judging them or trying to change them.
Acceptance means letting go of attempts to control your emotions and learning that emotions themselves cannot harm you,
Although the things you may do to try to get rid of emotions,
Such as misusing alcohol,
Can harm you.
Make sure that you understand the distinction between what you feel versus what you do to try to get rid of emotions.
It's essential to make the distinction also between acceptance and resignation.
Accepting emotions does not mean that you resign yourself to constantly feeling terrible.
Acceptance simply means being aware of your emotions and accepting them for what they are right now,
Knowing that they won't last.
In some ways,
Accepting your emotions means also accepting that emotions will change.
When you're happy,
You have to accept that happiness is a short-term condition.
You will not always be happy.
And this is true for every emotion.
So the first step to manage your emotions is to accept them.
