Feeling crabby lately? Need better sleep? Troubled by an open memory or a past unpleasant experience? You might consider trying the strategy of "reframe" on how you think about the memory using the language of thankfulness.
Gratitude helps us reframe memories of unpleasant events in a way that decreases their unpleasant emotional impact i.e. to look at them in a different way - to assign a fresh perspective. Psychologists call this technique reframing.
Grateful people sleep better. No pills necessary. This is because Gratitude protects against negative pre-sleep mental activities that impair sleep, and facilitates positive pre-sleep mental activities leading to quality sleep. Spend just 15 minutes jotting down a few grateful sentiments before zzzzzzz, and you will sleep better and longer. Study has showed that Gratitude predicted greater sleep quality and sleep duration, and less sleep latency and daytime dysfunction.
Note that the goal of reframing isn't to change the emotion itself but how you relate to it. As the name suggests, reframing is like putting a new frame around an old picture. In reframing, you look for the meaning, opportunity, or benefit from the feeling, even when the feeling is negative. In this way, you raise the likelihood that you'll make insight-driven decisions.
This implies that grateful coping entails looking for positive consequences of negative events. For example, grateful coping might involve seeing how a stressful event has shaped who we are today and has prompted us to reevaluate what is really important in life.
The unpleasant experiences in our lives don’t have to be of the traumatic variety in order for us to gratefully benefit from them. Whether it is a large or small event, here are some additional questions to ask yourself:
Remember, your goal is not to relive the experience but rather to get a new perspective on it. Simply rehearsing an upsetting event makes us feel worse about it. That is why catharsis has rarely been effective. Emotional venting without accompanying insight does not produce change. No amount of writing about the event will help unless you are able to take a fresh, redemptive perspective on it. This is an advantage that grateful people have—and it is a skill that anyone can learn.
Gratitude helps us reframe memories of unpleasant events in a way that decreases their unpleasant emotional impact i.e. to look at them in a different way - to assign a fresh perspective. Psychologists call this technique reframing.
Note that the goal of reframing isn't to change the emotion itself but how you relate to it. As the name suggests, reframing is like putting a new frame around an old picture. In reframing, you look for the meaning, opportunity, or benefit from the feeling, even when the feeling is negative. In this way, you raise the likelihood that you'll make insight-driven decisions.
The unpleasant experiences in our lives don’t have to be of the traumatic variety in order for us to gratefully benefit from them. Whether it is a large or small event, here are some additional questions to ask yourself:
- What lessons did the experience teach me?
- Can I find ways to be thankful for what happened to me now even though I was not at the time it happened?
- What ability did the experience draw out of me that surprised me?
- How am I now more the person I want to be because of it? Have my negative feelings about the experience limited or prevented my ability to feel gratitude in the time since it occurred?
- Has the experience removed a personal obstacle that previously prevented me from feeling grateful?
Remember, your goal is not to relive the experience but rather to get a new perspective on it. Simply rehearsing an upsetting event makes us feel worse about it. That is why catharsis has rarely been effective. Emotional venting without accompanying insight does not produce change. No amount of writing about the event will help unless you are able to take a fresh, redemptive perspective on it. This is an advantage that grateful people have—and it is a skill that anyone can learn.
No comments:
Post a Comment