Well-being isn’t all positivity

I talk a lot about mental and emotional well-being for authors, and something I notice in responses is the idea that what I mean is you may someday reach a point where you feel good all the time and nothing affects you. Y’all probably already know this, but that’s not what well-being looks like, right? 

Think of it this way: Does a person grinning like a fool at a funeral strike you as having robust mental and emotional health? Or would you wonder if they were responsible for the death somehow? This is because we’re not shooting for feeling good and being unaffected by life. 

Well-being is allowing ourselves the freedom to feel negative emotions appropriate to the reality we’re facing… and keep putting one foot in front of the other. It means letting ourselves be affected by things, not armoring up against life. 

Real fortitude of well-being is when we choose to respond with the courage to stay connected with ourselves and others through the good times and the bad. If you feel like only the positive is worth sharing with those who care about you, it’s time to reconsider. 

Trying to be unaffected by the outside world is one of the fastest ways to sever our connection to ourselves and others. It takes bravery to let yourself be affected, to let your heart break during tragedy and to bask in joy when you find it. 

Well-being means learning to live with all of yourself. Not acting on our harmful impulses, of course, but recognizing that they come from a place of pain and fear, so you don’t have to pretend they’re not there. 

So, if you’ve been beating yourself up because you don’t feel particularly positive lately or you find yourself being emotionally and mentally affected by some of the things happening in your life, great news: You might have more well-being than you realize. 

That’s not to say there’s virtue in staying down in the dumps, but when life throws mud at you, it’s okay to feel some way about that. Simply lying to yourself with “I LOVE MUD!” is not the sign of health some folks would have us believe. 

So what do you think? Is it possible that you have more mental and emotional well-being than you were giving yourself credit for?