Imagine you’ve just received news that the person to whom you’re emotionally closest has unexpectedly perished. This could be an intimate partner, grandparent, child, best friend, or perhaps a high school debate teacher.
Can you envisage what emotional response you may experience from your beliefs about this news? Would you be ecstatic? Might you experience pleasure?
Do you conceive of being so overcome with joy that your hair begins to float, your clothes spiral in circles, and flower petals gently fall all around you? If so, I’d like to suggest that your fanaticized response is representative of a positive emotional experience.
This suggestion doesn’t imply morality. I’m not expressing that your envisioned emotive response is good or righteous. When discussing positive and negative emotions from a mental, emotional, and behavioral health perspective, I’m referring to what one source outlines:
Certainly moments in people’s lives characterized by experiences of positive emotions—such as joy, interest, contentment, love, and the like—are moments in which they are not plagued by negative emotions—such as anxiety, sadness, anger, and despair.
Moreover, from the viewpoint of Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT), I’m alluding to unhealthy versus (vs.) healthy negative emotions – as it’s highly improbable that you would experience joy or pleasure when hearing news of the person you most cherish suddenly having passed away.
According to page 87 of The REBT Therapist’s Pocket Companion (“Pocket Companion”), people experience self-disturbance when enduring unhealthy negative emotions and because they don’t experience healthy negative emotions when it’s appropriate to do so.
For example, if you imagined having received word that the most adored individual in your life inexplicably died, you may’ve envisioned experiencing sorrow, shock, regret, despair, anger, confusion, or abandonment. Perhaps you actually felt one of these emotions when imagining the negative event.
Exploring the finer points of REBT, in regards to the ABC model, there is a notable difference between positive and negative events. For instance, suppose I invited you to consider that the person to whom you’re emotionally closest has suddenly won the lottery.
This likely represents a positive event for many people, whereas an unexpected death of your loved one may relate to a negative event. Beliefs about the former could yield joyous or pleasurable consequences while assumptions about the latter may produce uncomfortable reactions.
When you experience a negative event and maintain an irrational belief about the situation, it’s reasonable to conclude that you will disturb yourself into an unhealthy negative emotional state. Although you may not realize it, your assumptions about negative events have a significant impact on how you feel.
Revisiting the emotions one may experience when learning of a sudden death, think about which you consider unhealthy vs. healthy: sorrow, shock, regret, despair, anger, confusion, or abandonment. By “unhealthy” and “healthy,” I’m referring to that which isn’t or is indicative of, conducive to, or promoting one’s desirable standard of health.
Regarding the grieving process, does your standard of health relate to regret, despair, or abandonment? These may be understood as particularly unhealthy emotional experiences.
Alternatively, sorrow, shock, anger, and confusion – although not necessarily pleasant – can be perceived as healthy or natural emotive experiences. Page 88 of the Pocket Companion invites REBT practitioners to explore unhealthy vs. healthy emotions with clients, as demonstrated herein.
Still, page 89 of the Pocket Companion encourages REBT practitioners to understand that unhealthy negative emotions (e.g., concern vs. anxiety and remorse vs. guilt) is an aim of REBT, though clinicians are reminded not to remain rigid concerning emotional descriptions.
This is partially due to the fact that just because certain emotions are deemed unhealthy by REBT theory, clients may not desire to target these feelings for change. Besides, determining what is unhealthy vs. healthy is a highly subjective process and an individual may choose not to concur with an REBT practitioner’s assessment of negative emotions.
Ultimately, if you are so overcome with joy that your hair begins to float, your clothes spiral in circles, and flower petals gently fall all around you when discovering that the person to whom you’re emotionally closest has unexpectedly perished, so be it.
Likewise, if you experience regret, despair, or abandonment – and choose to feel this way – so be it. The important takeaway lesson herein is that your beliefs about positive and negative events can produce unhealthy or healthy emotive states.
While I make no judgment about the consequences of my clients’ beliefs, I invite them to consider whether or not their assumptions serve my clients’ interests and goals. If a person desires not to needlessly suffer, I then explore healthy negative emotions as an alternative to those of an unhealthy variety.
If you’re looking for a provider who works to help you understand how thinking impacts physical, mental, emotional, and behavioral elements of your life—helping you to sharpen your critical thinking skills, I invite you to reach out today by using the contact widget on my website.
As a psychotherapist, I’m pleased to help people with an assortment of issues ranging from anger (hostility, rage, and aggression) to relational issues, adjustment matters, trauma experience, justice involvement, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, anxiety and depression, and other mood or personality-related matters.
At Hollings Therapy, LLC, serving all of Texas, I aim to treat clients with dignity and respect while offering a multi-lensed approach to the practice of psychotherapy and life coaching. My mission includes: Prioritizing the cognitive and emotive needs of clients, an overall reduction in client suffering, and supporting sustainable growth for the clients I serve. Rather than simply helping you to feel better, I want to help you get better!
Deric Hollings, LPC, LCSW
References:
Dryden, W. and Neenan, M. (2003). The REBT Therapist’s Pocket Companion. Albert Ellis Institute. ISBN 0-917476-26-3. Library of Congress Control Number: 20031044378
Fredrickson, B. L. (2011, June 24). The role of positive emotions in positive psychology. American Psychologist. Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3122271/
Hollings, D. (2022, March 15). Disclaimer. Hollings Therapy, LLC. Retrieved from https://www.hollingstherapy.com/post/disclaimer
Hollings, D. (2023, September 8). Fair use. Hollings Therapy, LLC. Retrieved from https://www.hollingstherapy.com/post/fair-use
Hollings, D. (2024, February 13). Focus on the target problem. Hollings Therapy, LLC. Retrieved from https://www.hollingstherapy.com/post/focus-on-the-target-problem
Hollings, D. (2023, October 12). Get better. Hollings Therapy, LLC. Retrieved from https://www.hollingstherapy.com/post/get-better
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Hollings, D. (2024, January 2). Interests and goals. Hollings Therapy, LLC. Retrieved from https://www.hollingstherapy.com/post/interests-and-goals
Hollings, D. (2023, May 18). Irrational beliefs. Hollings Therapy, LLC. Retrieved from https://www.hollingstherapy.com/post/irrational-beliefs
Hollings, D. (2023, September 19). Life coaching. Hollings Therapy, LLC. Retrieved from https://www.hollingstherapy.com/post/life-coaching
Hollings, D. (2023, October 2). Morals and ethics. Hollings Therapy, LLC. Retrieved from https://www.hollingstherapy.com/post/morals-and-ethics
Hollings, D. (2022, March 24). Rational emotive behavior therapy (REBT). Hollings Therapy, LLC. Retrieved from https://www.hollingstherapy.com/post/rational-emotive-behavior-therapy-rebt
Hollings, D. (2024, January 4). Rigid vs. rigorous. Hollings Therapy, LLC. Retrieved from https://www.hollingstherapy.com/post/rigid-vs-rigorous
Hollings, D. (2022, November 1). Self-disturbance. Hollings Therapy, LLC. Retrieved from https://www.hollingstherapy.com/post/self-disturbance
Hollings, D. (2022, November 9). The ABC model. Hollings Therapy, LLC. Retrieved from https://www.hollingstherapy.com/post/the-abc-model
Mr. X. (2024, March 18). Happy, indelible [Image]. Playground. Retrieved from https://playground.com/post/happy-indelible-cltx97ew201p7s601kzx62hj8