What do YOU do when you are sad?

It was so interesting - I started reading quotes on "sadness" today. I was just looking for a picture, to post in the article, but what came up blew my mind.

Almost every quote or picture I came across had a "you are the only one who can make me happy"...... SAY WHAT? I understand that when we are in love, we want our person to be around, but ultimately our happiness comes down to US!

So "Sadness" from the movie 'Inside Out' seems to be the best fitting picture for my post tonight because sadness is an important part of life and is often here to teach us something!

I was sad today .... nothing major "happened" - just sad. So then I began to wonder, what do other people do when they are sad?

I would have liked to climb in to my bed, put on a movie (or my favorite Netflix series Grace & Frankie), drink tea, and wallow in my sadness for a bit .... but you know what? I would be MORE SAD if I had followed through on that!

When we go in to an emotion, it is easy to stay in that emotion - and eventually we feel like we are on the never ending hamster wheel!!! What we can do instead of driving ourselves insane (the definition of insanity is repeating the same thing and expecting different results) are things like:

* ACKNOWLEDGE THE FEELING: As silly as this may sound, just by saying to yourself, "Oh, I'm sad" is a HUGE step to moving on!

* ASK THE FEELING WHAT IT IS TEACHING YOU: Then ask, "what lesson am I getting from this sadness?"

Usually once we've acknowledged and accepted that the feeling is there to teach us something, we are better able to move on!

I definitely moved on today ... I know why sadness was visiting me today (that's an entirely different blog post), and instead of spending the day in my bed with tea and an awesome show that makes me laugh, I CRUSHED my day!!! I had 4 meetings, worked out, made healthy meals for the kids and I, made a video, went grocery shopping, laughed with my kids, and even snuck in a bit of Zumba with my favorite Zumba Queen!

So what do you do when you are sad? Would you be willing to try acknowledge and ask? I would love to know and I would also love to know if you have other tactics that help deal with when Sadness comes to visit you!

<3 T