Don’t Let Negative Experiences Control Your Life

Our lives are a continual succession of negative and positive experiences that we live, share and feel, no matter how they affect us.

Among all of them,  negative experiences are the ones that mark us the most,  because our natural state, in which we are happiest, is when everything goes well and we are only aware of time and our own existence.

Negative experiences are necessary in our life. They can help position us on our path, learn to make better choices, know how to discern what we want from what we don’t.

In short, every experience, but especially those negative, help us to be better people. But what happens when this is not the case? What happens when these experiences control our lives?

When negative experiences control me

You’re likely to believe that the negative experiences you have, rather than making your life better, make it worse. What do we mean by that? That they condition you.

For example, think of the following situations that we are going to describe, as many of them you have already experienced:

• If someone publicly humiliates me for a comment I have made, I will avoid saying what I think so that it doesn’t happen again.
• If my partner blames our breakup on me, perhaps in my next relationship, I will act cautiously and submissively.
• I always try to think like others so that people don’t get upset with me and accept me.

These and many other situations cause something very natural, which is the search for pleasure and the avoidance of pain, experienced in every negative experience.

But sometimes, this fear of finding ourselves helpless in the face of an unexpected situation makes us put on a mask to hide what we cannot resolve.

Masks that make us appear to be someone we are not and that, instead of helping us to face our problem, make our pain increase.

In my life I command

Even though negative experiences hurt and affect us more intensely, we must prevent them from controlling and directing our lives.

Only we can decide how we are going to live our lives, how we want to act, how we want to proceed… Experiences should make us advance, improve, but never go backwards. And furthermore, experiences should never cause our unhappiness.

How then are we to act with respect to these negative experiences?

• Never feel sorry for yourself, nor throw blames on yourself that you shouldn’t. What happened is already in the past, this is the time to see the present with security and positivity.
• Don’t let your feelings sink you into a sadness that is difficult to get out of. Feel them, but don’t let them wash over you like a tsunami. Shout “enough!” and move on.
• Don’t get carried away by your thoughts, as they will go around a thousand times and make you feel confused and paralyzed by the situation. Put a brake on your thoughts and start acting.
• Actively choose your life, be the one who chooses how to live it and push away every negative experience that forces you to change your path.

It is true that negative experiences cause insecurity, doubts, discomfort, sadness… but all of these can be overcome and only you have the power to do so.

If you want to get out of this situation, you must start fighting these feelings that try to drag you like a current.

Avoid confused thoughts that will do nothing more than paralyze you,  and focus seriously on what you want.

We’re not saying you shouldn’t feel this insecurity, assimilate it, live it, but you can’t let it control you.

Look at negative experiences as situations to learn from. From every negative thing you can get something positive, something that only you can find, something that only you will decide to experience.