I feel like some of us know not to do this and others are lost to the "addiction" that is feeling sorry for yourself. It makes you feel all these things, makes you feel like you're justified, and the more you do it the more you want to do it. But what if I told you that it's an endless spiral that only made things worse? Would you believe me?
Amy Morin, author of 13 Things Mentally Strong People Don't Do, explains that "indulging in self-pity" usually results in the following things:
wasted time
more negative emotions
a self-fulfilling prophecy being created
you don't deal with other emotions
you overlook the good in your life
In the survey that I mentioned doing before (my mini-survey of 10 people haha), I ended up with an interesting conclusion: Most people admitted to feeling sorry for themselves in their more difficult situations. For some, this only happened around a few times a week while for others, it was near constant. Point is, we all engage in self-pity to some degree and we often might not even realize what that means about our mentality in those moments.
There are a few ways to combat this, however, and in Amy Morin's book, she names quite a few, but essentially it falls along the lines of this: "Behave in a manner that makes it hard to feel sorry for yourself." When can you not feel sorry for yourself? When you're exhilarated, perhaps? When you're doing something enjoyable? Productive, even? Everyone's different so everyone might have a different answer, but you can experiment with this! What makes you stop your self-pity?
Morin also suggests 2 other options, which I'll let you discover for yourself should you choose to read her book, but the point is, you can combat self-pity! Not only that, but you should combat self-pity!
In my personal life, I engage in self-pity a lot. My family life wouldn't be described as the greatest, my physical health isn't really doing so hot most days, and my mental health is usually down in the dumps. But the truth is, despite what I may believe sometimes, my situation isn't worse than everyone else's.
Ultimately, I think we all have a little bit to work on here, whether we're "pros" at self-pitying or whether we only indulge our self-pitying desires every once in a while. But remember, Warriors, you're not alone! I'll be working on this too, along with every other "step" in this series. If you'd like to here the other "tips" that I gleaned from Amy Morin's book, then stay tuned for what else I've got coming up! Better yet, if you'd like to read the book yourself... well, go read it!! I highly recommend it and it'll give you way better advice than what I've summarized in this series.
That's all I've got for today, though, so I wish you a happy and blessed day. Keep fighting, Warriors! You got this!
Reference:
Morin, A. (2017). 13 Things Mentally Strong People Don’t Do : Take Back Your Power, Embrace Change, Face Your Fears, And Train Your Brain For Happiness And Success. W. Morrow.