When you’re feeling sad
Allowing yourself to feel what you feel
“You cannot protect yourself from sadness without protecting yourself from happiness.”
Jonathan Safran Foer
We’re not supposed to feel happy all the time. In fact, in order to experience true happiness, you have to experience sadness.
To be clear, I’m not talking about the loss of a loved one and the intense grief that follows. I’m also not talking about clinical depression. I’m talking about that occasional nagging feeling of melancholy that you have trouble explaining; that general feeling of joylessness that hits us every once in a while.
Feeling sad isn’t fun and we don’t want to spend long there. So what can you do when the blues kick in?
The first step is to allow yourself to feel what you feel. Spend time mindfully noticing your negative thoughts. Are you able to pinpoint why you’re feeling low? By spending time in meditation you’ll be able to pull yourself out of the sadness in a healthy way.
Sadness is always caused by your thoughts. You may think that an external situation or event is causing your sadness, but situations are always neutral until we assign meaning to them and have a thought. Our thoughts produce an emotional response and we begin to experience certain feelings. That means if you can change the way you’re thinking, how you feel will change as well.
There are several different kinds of meditation that can help when you’re feeling low. You can try a version of a loving kindness meditation which will allow you to experience loving feelings towards yourself, someone close to you, and even strangers. There are many versions of this kind of meditation available.
Here’s a meditation for sadness you can try next time you’re feeling a little low.
Meditation for Sadness
It’s best to do this meditation sitting up. Find a comfortable seat either in a chair, on the couch, or sitting on a meditation cushion on the floor. Let your hands rest comfortably on your lap or, if you’re so inclined, you can use your favorite mudra. You can keep your eyes open gazing softly at something in the room, or gently close them if that’s comfortable for you.
Begin to notice your breath. Breathe in and out through your nose and see if you can keep the breaths even.
When you’re ready, see if you can begin to notice where the sadness is living in your body. Do you, for example, feel a heaviness in your chest or a sensation in your belly? Does sadness move around or vibrate? Spend some time noticing your bodily sensations.
If any area of your body feels tense, see if you can breathe into that area and relax it.
Continue breathing and noticing sensations. If you find yourself thinking, gently notice the thought and then see if you can let it go. Be an observer of your thoughts and try not to become attached to them.
Notice your general mood as you continue this meditation. Have there been any shifts? There doesn’t need to be and there are no expectations. Just feel what you feel and continue to notice.
Continue in this way - breathing and noticing thoughts and sensations - until you’re ready to move on with your day.
Did you try this meditation? What did you notice? As always, I encourage you to get out your journal and write about your experience. Write down what you recall thinking and feeling. Be as descriptive as you can.
Other things to try when you’re sad include any sort of movement (walking, running, yoga, etc.), journaling, talking to someone (a friend, family member, therapist and/or coach), taking a nap, reading a good book, focusing on your breath, listening to music, doing something creative, and (my favorite!) having a good cry.
Feeling sad is a normal reaction when you’re in a difficult situation. Meditation, movement and other mindful practices are a great place to start and will often help stop the sadness from turning into depression.
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"I felt at complete ease with Sharon from our first conversation. She has a wonderful, gentle but firm way that made me focus on my thoughts / feelings so I could remove / change to move forward with a completely different feeling to what felt like obstacles. It was great having regular coaching that gently kept me accountable to actioning and moving towards my goals. Sharon has vast experience in so many areas, I felt that makes her an amazing coach.”
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