What is sadness? What are the possible causes? What are the solutions to get rid of sadness and depression?

When we have a disappointment, when we lose a loved one, when a project collapses, it is healthy to experience sadness. The moment of sadness will inactivate us and allow us to stop wanting, during the time of mourning. Sadness is an emotion that stimulates the parasympathetic system, that branch of the nervous system that causes us to rest, sleep, heal, or retreat. Sadness or melancholy places us out of time to mourn a loss, reflect on its meaning and then make psychological changes that will allow us to move on.

If bereavement is helpful, depression seems to be detrimental to our health. It results in a feeling of sadness associated with self-pity and despair.

Many studies have tried to measure the effects. While few have established a direct link between depression and disease, many have measured the impact of emotional state on healing once an illness has been established. But solutions exist and depression is not inevitable.

How to Get Rid of Sadness and Depression?

However, when the sadness takes the form of a deep depression, connected to the sensation of not having any quality, to absolute despair, to the absence of chronic joy, to the loss of the pleasure of taste and all pleasure related to sensations, to the feeling that nothing has interest and that it has deleterious effects such as insomnia, confusion, overwhelming feeling almost like physical pain, the desire of suicide, etc., the solution is medical and does not take over (or not only) what follows. In short, then it’s time to seriously think about how to overcome sadness and depression.

I – Definition and Description of Sadness

Sadness is a natural human emotion. It is most often a transient state, benign and without risk. But if this feeling is lasting or worsening, it is important to confide and/or consult a health professional.

Sadness is an emotional pain associated with, or characterized by feelings of disadvantage, loss, hopelessness, or grief. A sad individual faces a lethargic state and retreats to others. Crying is often an indication of sadness. Sadness is one of the “seven basic emotions” described by Paul Ekman, among them joy, anger, surprise, fear, scorn, and disgust.

In other words, sadness is an emotion, which expresses emotional pain associated with or characterized by feelings of hopelessness, grief, helplessness, and disappointment. It can be manifested by crying, loss of appetite, or loss of vitality. In the most severe cases, sadness can lead to more or less profound lethargy and social isolation.

The sadness, the feeling of depression or sadness due to mourning, discouragement, disappointment, or any other psychic trauma. If it is durable, this feeling may indicate depression.

II – Possible Causes of Sadness

The causes of the feeling of sadness are multiple and can vary from one individual to another. Certain crucial stages of life are typically accompanied by this emotion. These include:

– the loss of a loved one and the process of mourning that follows is accompanied by a feeling of deep sadness that disappears with time and acceptance disappears. But this feeling may reappear from time to time when memories are remembered;

– a change of life with great upheavals, such as a move or the end of studies that can be accompanied by sadness at the nostalgia of past good times;

– The birth of a child and the hormonal upheavals that this implies can cause a feeling of sadness in many mothers. In many cases, these “baby blues” do not last and disappears in the weeks following delivery. If he settles down more deeply and in the long term, it is called postpartum depression;

– or a break in love or friendship, which is lived as mourning and usually causes a feeling of sadness.

Note that depression is a severe form of sadness that is accompanied by negative and devaluing thoughts, feelings of hopelessness and many symptoms, such as loss of sleep, appetite, or morbid thoughts. The disease sets in chronically and must be differentiated from a temporary “blues” or the sadness felt at the loss of a loved one, for example.

To note: The sadness can be normal. It indicates an underlying disease only when feelings become excessive and exhausting, and interfere with everyday life.

III – Solutions to Get Rid of Sadness and Depression

Sadness is not bad in itself. But when it takes the form of depression, you have to react. Emmanuel Pascal, author of the 3 healing emotions gives you three solutions to fight sadness before it becomes harmful.

The solutions proposed here are effective as long as you have enough strength to put them into practice. They are of three types: Behavioral, cognitive, and emotional.

*** Behavioral Solutions to Get Rid of Sadness and Depression

They consist of turning away from melancholy by taking care of something else and more particularly, meeting other people: going out, going to see an exhibition, a film or a show. In short, have fun with family or friends. Distractions and conviviality are effective because they divert attention from sadness to other sensations. The important thing is to get out of isolation which is the classic tendency of the depressed person to be in contact with others. An equally effective solution is to turn to others in a generous action.

*** Cognitive Solutions to Get Rid of Sadness and Depression

They can be summed up as “positive thinking”. Man has the ability to select his thoughts. Positive thinking is about focusing one’s attention on joyful things. A strategic watch must be put in place to discard, whenever they appear, sad thoughts in favor of pleasant images.

Positive thinking also involves choosing activities or readings: if you are depressed, chances are you tend to naturally choose the least fun activities among those offered to you. Just be aware of this trend and take the opposite resolution: for example, avoid stressful or sad novels, run away from dramatic movies and opt for comedies, upbeat stories. It requires a certain vigilance because you have old reflexes. Your emotional re-education goes through that. Just take a resolution and do not worry if you do not keep it permanently. Positive thinking is learned and learning takes time and patience.

*** Emotional Solutions to Get Rid of Sadness and Depression

The combination of positive feeling and cardiac coherence improves overall emotional regulation by rapidly increasing the propensity to feel joyous emotions on a daily basis. But in depressed people, Emmanuel Pascal, with his experience as a cardiac coach, offers a different kind of breathing: breathing in frequency 3. That is 3 breathing cycles (inspiration/expiration) per minute, which corresponds to an inspiration of 10 seconds followed by a 10-second deep breath for at least 3 minutes, 9 times in all. Once this respiratory rate has been adopted, it must be associated with positive emotion to reinforce its beneficial effects.

In Summary

In a general way, everyone can one day or another be confronted, during his life, with experiences or difficult moments that will generate a feeling of sadness. In most cases, this feeling is healthy and it will disappear with time and acceptance. However, even though sadness is a normal emotion we all feel, there are certain things that can be done in everyday life that can help limit that feeling.

*** A Few Gestures to Overcome Sadness and Depression

– have a healthy and balanced diet;

– to take care of the quality and the quantity of his daily sleep;

– exercise daily;

– take the time to relax and relax with recreational activities;

– take the time to notice the good things in life and the small victories it offers;

– develop a social life and human contacts;

– share feelings with someone who is interested – like a parent or close friend. – Talking to a professional, such as a doctor or counselor can also help to analyze the origins of this feeling of sadness;

– or be in contact with nature during walks in the forest, in a park, or on a hike. These simple behaviors have been identified as beneficial to mental and physical health (the Japanese speak of Shinrin-Yoku, literally “forest bath”).