By Daniel J. Benor, MD

Lynne Namka suggested this topic in the context of post-election blues. It is certainly a common experience that when the person you voted for is not elected, you may feel frustrated, angry, anxious and worried about possible negative outcomes with the person you did not vote for taking office.

There are many other contexts, as well, in which similar post-event blues occur.

How many times have you walked away from a conversation, saying to yourself, “I could kick myself for having opened my mouth like that in front of my friend, my family member, co-worker, boss or class”?

How many times have you done the same number on yourself for having remained silent in similar circumstances?

How many times have you stepped on someone’s toes unintentionally, doing something you realized was hurtful or needlessly provocative?

Such recriminations may eat away at you, spoiling your enjoyment at the time of your misstep, and lingering for hours, for days or even longer after the event. You may be perfectly accurate in your assessment of damages done in such situations, or you may have been overly-critical and harsh with yourself.

An approach for dealing with such situations is to convert your worries and fretting – which are usually unproductive self-nagging – into more constructive and helpful forms of concern. Worry is turning the screws on yourself. Concern is sorting out the issues, considering you options and deciding on your best course of action.

For many of us, it is easier to make such suggestions than to follow them. Our worries seem to take on lives of their own and to plague us beyond all reason. It’s a bit like wanting to not think of a purple porcupine. The more we push away at such a thought or image, the more it seems to gather strength to pester and nag us.

A helpful approach in dealing with these sorts of issues is to decrease the intensity of emotions and vividness of memories attached to the experiences. This is easily and rapidly achievable with TWR , a self-healing method. By focusing the mind on the relevant issues and alternately tapping on the right and left side of the body, adding a counteracting affirmation at the end of the process, the negative self-perceptions and self-criticisms can be released quite readily. Then, using a similar process, you can replace the negatives with positive cognitions and feelings.

You may reproduce all or parts of this article in your journal, magazine, ezine, blog or other web or paper publication on condition that you credit the source as follows: Copyright © 2012 Daniel J. Benor, MD, ABHM   All rights reserved. Original publication at  WholisticHealingResearch.com  where you will find many more related articles on this and similar subjects of wholistic healing.