Mantra with Jemma Sbeg - I Let Myself Feel Disappointed

Episode Date: November 17, 2025

This week’s mantra is I Let Myself Feel Disappointed. Not everything needs a silver lining, and not every moment needs to be spun into a lesson. This episode explores the harm of toxic positivity and the importance of making space for real, raw emotions, especially the ones we’re taught to skip over. Letting yourself feel disappointed doesn’t make you ungrateful or negative. It makes you honest. This mantra is an invitation to stop forcing a smile and start honoring what’s true, because healing begins when you allow yourself to feel it all.Mantra is an OpenMind Original Podcast, powered by PAVE Studios. Listen wherever you get your podcasts. For ad-free listening and early access to episodes, subscribe to OpenMind+ on Apple Podcasts. Don’t miss out on all things Mantra! Instagram: @mantraopenmind | @OpenMindStudios TikTok: @OpenMind Facebook: @0penmindstudios X: @OpenMindStudios YouTube: @OpenMind_Studios To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This is Open Mind. Welcome to a brand new week. Here is your mantra. I let myself feel disappointed. I'm Gemma Spag and every Monday I give you a simple but powerful phrase to consider and bring into your life, a philosophy to guide you in the week ahead and hopefully even beyond. In each episode, I like to unpack what our mantra really means, how it has shown up in my own life and how you can bring it into yours

with journal prompts, tips and psychological strategies to help you take this mantra and put it into action. At Open Mind, we value your support, so please make sure to share your thoughts on social media and remember to rate, review and follow mantra to help others discover the show. For more exclusive content, monthly bonus episodes,

early access, and ad-free listening, join our Open Mind Plus community on Apple Podcasts. Each month, I also love to respond to your questions and comments in our bonus episodes, so you can leave me a comment on this very episode or on Instagram at Mantra Open Mind if you would like to be featured. Stick around.

We will be right back after this short pause. If you missed my live show, don't stress, you can still be part of it. The full thing is available on demand at pave.live. Live, but only until November 30th. So if you want to catch the real talk, the big feelings, and the unfiltered VIP after-party, this is your chance. Head to pave.orgive.com. Now and watch the full video before it disappears. Is it the matcha or am I this energized from scoring three Sephora holiday gift sets? Definitely the sets. Full size and minis bundled together?

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Shop before they're gone. In store or online at Sephora.ca. Okay, let's get right into it. It is time for this week's mantra. I let myself feel disappointed. What I really think is at the core of this mantra, what I really think this is all about, is toxic positivity and fighting against toxic positivity.

So let's just start there. Toxic positivity, if you haven't heard of this before, it is basically the belief that no matter what challenges, pains you or what you struggle with, whatever you are going through, you should always maintain a positive attitude. You should always be attempting to look on the bright side, look for the silver lining. Imagine the person who has it worse than you. Emotions like sadness, anger, grief, or of course, disappointment are painted by this mindset as actually a choice and we can either choose endless optimism and feel happy all the time

or let ourselves, allow ourselves, feel bad. And if we do that, that's on us. What this approach means is that there seems to be two types of emotions, those that are acceptable and those that aren't. And the acceptable ones are the pretty ones, the nice ones, the happy ones. The unacceptable ones, the grief, the shame, the disappointment. those need to be hidden. Not so much for us but for others. The thing about toxic positivity is that it isn't always explicit. This is kind of what it can sound like day to day. This is how you can recognize it, perhaps in your interactions with other people or in your own life. Some of the things that people may say are, you know, everything happens for a reason, even though what's happened

is something that is truly devastating or really upsetting. Other people have it so much worse. so you shouldn't complain. You'll get over it. Just give it time. I think we hear that a lot with romantic rejection or relationships. Sentences that are prefaced with, at least. At least you have a job. At least you're healthy. At least you don't have to worry about this or that.

At least you're not that person. Another one, you know, if you stay optimistic, if you think good thoughts, the universe will reward you. Or just outright dismissal that there is no reason to be upset. There is no reason to be annoyed. You should just be grateful. Gratitude will solve all your problems. Those are some like explicit ways that you might see it showing up. They're a bit more loud. There are some more subtle ways that this kind of makes its way into conversations and makes its way into our life as well. For example, yes, someone might not say,

give it time or everything happens for a reason, but they may immediately change the conversation or appear uncomfortable when you talk openly about your disappointments. They may immediately offer solutions instead of just listening to you. They may minimize your experience. They may act annoyed or impatient with you. They may try and rush you through the emotional experience you're having so that you get over it and get back to the happy persona that they want from you. I think people just aren't comfortable with some of the hardest parts of life.

but that doesn't mean they don't happen and it doesn't mean they don't suck. You are allowed to be upset or disappointed by something you really wanted or by something that you really thought was going to happen and didn't. Even if someone somewhere has it worse, there will always be someone who has it worse, that doesn't discount or undermine the feeling that you are having. The issue is when we start as well to take this toxic, optimistic optimism on board ourselves. Instead of acknowledging that something mattered to us and that it didn't go the way we hoped, we immediately try to reframe it. We force ourselves to be grateful.

We force ourselves to downplay the experience. On the surface, you know, that actually might look like resilience, which is why it's kind of confusing. But underneath, it's often kind of a form of like self gaslighting. Like you're convincing yourself, you don't care when in fact you deeply, deeply do. And it can leave us feeling, I think, oddly, very hollow, very disconnected from our desires, because, you know, we've trained ourselves to believe it's not acceptable or safe to feel let down. What is the cost of this emotional suppression? When we suppress our emotions, because that is basically what we're doing here, we are suppressing disappointment, frustration, annoyance, all of those kind of feelings. We basically cut ourselves off from one of

the most important sources of self-knowledge we have. Emotions are signals. They tell us what matters. They tell us where our boundaries are. They tell us what we need to pay attention to, what we really desire, where we should point our ambitions towards. So by ignoring or avoiding them, we lose really valuable feedback about our own lives. You know, for instance, disappointment really signals that we care deeply about something,

that we had high expectations for ourselves and for our lives. They give us a sign of what we are truly searching for in our future, hence why the reaction to not getting it feels so intense. I think that's all information that is deeply enriching and rewarding and that I think that we should explore more. But without allowing ourselves to fully feel every dimension and crevice of this emotion, we do actually miss out on opportunities for growth and self-reflection. here's the other thing. No one has ever made their life better. No one has gotten better,

developed as a person by only letting themselves feel a very small subset of their emotions and thinking that that was enough. You know, yeah, disappointment may feel uncomfortable, losing out on a job you really wanted, feeling let down by a friend, being rejected by a potential boyfriend or girlfriend, that sucks. I've experienced all of those things, but it is all part of our broader emotional experiences and catalog of experiences that have been gifted to us or that maybe are required of us as humans. We've talked about this before, but psychologists often referenced this concept known as emo diversity, and it's this idea that experiencing and acknowledging a wide range of emotions is actually essential for our mental health. You can't

just have the good ones. Just like biodiversity strengthens ecosystems in nature, Emo diversity strengthens our psychological resilience. People who report greater emotional variety, including unpleasant feelings like sadness, frustration, disappointment. You know it might sound counterintuitive, but they often have better overall well-being and lower rates of depression. Suppressing emotions just like flattens our inner landscape. And so that means that we are stuck in a very narrow band of force positivity

that doesn't actually reflect the complexity of real life and that is actually rather boring as well. Avoiding emotions may feel easier in the short term, especially when perhaps you don't feel a lot of societal-based acceptance or openness to talk about it or manage it, but it does also come at the cost of long-term health. Research has shown that chronic emotional suppression is linked to higher stress. It is linked to a weakened immune system, even an increased risk of cardiovascular problems. This happens because when we push emotions down, our nervous system still reacts. Our heart rates increases, our cortisol rises, and our body really does carry the burden of what our minds refuse to process. Instead of releasing the emotion, instead of moving through it with flow

and with grace and, you know, with kindness towards ourselves, by not acknowledging it, by ignoring it, we trap it. And over time, that manifests as tension, it manifests as burnout or unexplained fatigue amongst many of the symptoms. So here are your options. You can either be open about your disappointments and, A, integrate important learnings better, B, actually recover from the setback faster. C, seemingly be happy a long term, have a greater level of control over your shifting emotional state, or the second option, you can pretend the things that actually really sting don't bother you and therefore deny your own emotions. Take longer to recover from them, maybe never recover from them, not learn anything new

about yourself, build up resentment and frustration, all to maybe make some people feel more comfortable. Just sit with that equation for a second because I think there is a very clear, a correct choice here. And that is to let yourself feel your disappointments. One final thing that I will say about this, acknowledging when we are disappointed also helps our relationships as well, which I think feels counter to what a lot of us have been taught. I know I used to be the kind of person who would never bring up stuff that annoyed me, who would never address it when a friend really let me down or my expectations weren't met. And because of that choice over time, I felt a lot worse about our relationship and I felt a lot worse about our dynamic compared to if I just

said, hey, this moment upset me, I feel let down. I want to hear your side of the story or I want to give you an opportunity to make it right and for us to grow together and kind of bond through this experience. That's actually a really incredible moment of vulnerability to say I'm disappointed and to let someone prove themselves to you and prove why perhaps they didn't mean to disappoint you, why they are perhaps in your life. It's something I'm definitely getting better at, and we're going to talk about how I'm getting better at that, and also how I've moved through some of those previous disappointments,

especially social disappointments, after this short break. So stick around. Welcome back. Now that we've looked at the meaning behind today's mantra, I let myself feel disappointed. It's time to get personal with you guys, and share some of my own insights and reflections about this phrase. Firstly, I think the area where I've experienced the most disappointment in my life,

at least in my recent memory, has mainly been in my relationships, and it's mainly been in friendships. I've had a few one-sided relationships in my time, especially a couple of years ago. I really noticed that this was kind of happening. I have this distinct memory, actually. of making dinner plans for me and three friends and, you know, having to put down that little deposit that sometimes they ask you to put down. Like, if you counsel, like you're going to

lose 50 bucks or something like that, I'd taken the initiative to make the plan, make the reservation. It's like two hours before the dinner and my friends canceled on me. And I felt really disappointed. And I didn't say anything. I would also have this experience of always organizing activities. I would always be planning trivia or group trips or, you know, fun things that we could do and then no one would reciprocate and I'd feel super let down. I would think, I would imagine that someone would at some stage also take the initiative that I was taking and they wouldn't. I just felt like I was putting in a lot of effort for others and I wasn't getting much in return. I want to say this was only a brief chapter or a brief stint of my life, but

it definitely lasted a good few years. And I just distinctly remember feeling so let down, feeling so disheartened, but just continually having this like optimistic, positive, some would say delusional take on things. I could always find an excuse for why I didn't deserve to be disappointed. I didn't need to interrogate these moments or interactions. I would say things like, you know, everyone has stuff on their plate. Or yeah, it's probably all a bit last minute anyways. or that's okay, like, I like doing things alone. The other big one I would always say was, you know, well, it's kind of my own fault. You know, I shouldn't do nice things if I'm expecting something in return.

When the nice thing I was doing was just making plans and like even just acknowledgement of my effort would have been really nice or like if my effort had even been reciprocated, it would have been nice. But I just was like blaming myself for having too high expectations. All is this kind of like barrier to feeling the full weight of the disappointment I was feeling about some of my friendships and some of the people who I really cared about. This lasted for a while until one day I just felt super depleted and I actually think it was after that dinner where these people cancelled. And my boyfriend was like, you know what,

this really sucks. Let me take you out for dinner. Let me organize something for you. And he made this like big effort for me. And yeah, it was such a beautiful moment. I was like super happy to be spending time with him. I felt really loved. I felt really grateful. But I also. I also. also just realized, because of how nice it felt, you know, how exhausted I was and how disappointed I wasn't my friends and partially in myself for making excuses for them. And I had my pity party moment where I just kind of cried on his shoulder a little bit and was like, I just feel really let down. And that was a turning point for me where I just slowly stopped instigating. I stopped over-extending myself to make everything work for others.

I stopped putting in 200% to people who weren't matching my energy. And you know what? Actually, sitting with that disappointment in that moment and letting myself feel sad and frustrated and hurt, it brought me a lot of clarity around who was going to meet me where I was at and fulfill my expectations and reciprocate my energy, and who wasn't? And it made me realize I do have high expectations for friendship. That's not a bad thing. That is not on me. I'm allowed to have high expectations, but people are equally allowed to not meet them. And I can continuously feel disappointed about it, or I can really just adjust and learn from what that disappointment is

teaching me. It was definitely painful, I will say. I've talked about period in my life before and how I did lose a few friends, but it really allowed me just to reappraise and assess what I wanted for my relationships. And if I was really happy, I still think I do have more of a lean towards positivity in the face of disappointment. I also don't think that that is holistically always going to be a bad thing, which might sound contradictory to what I've been talking about, but disappointment, it is informational and you are allowed to really sit in it for a little bit and acknowledge it and feel it. But you do lose some of that information if you wallow in it for too long. Wallowing in disappointment, sitting in disappointment and not doing anything about it

and not really finding any solutions or integrating it, it is actually going to keep us stuck in the past instead of learning from it. You can let yourself feel disappointment it. But part of letting yourself feel it is also not letting that feeling own you. And when we ruminate for too long, we start to replay the same story over and over. And that can actually strengthen a feeling of helplessness rather than the feeling of insight that we really want from this. I think we also start to get into this cycle of like, I'm unlucky. I'm just not enough. Like, I'm just a failure. That's not the cycle we want to get into. Not only does it deep and negative emotions, but it can also really start to distort how we see ourselves and what we

think we're capable of. And then we risk turning a temporary setback into a permanent mindset. And that closes us off. So once we've acknowledged our disappointment, once we've let our self feel it, we do have to realize that we are using this as a guidepost. We are asking ourselves what it reveals about our values, what it reveals about our needs and our expectations. and then positivity does somewhat become a tool to help us reframe and move forward, not to erase the disappointment, but to carry its lessons with us. I think this kind of balance, I like it. I think it allows us to feel the full depth of our emotions without getting stuck in them

or sucked into them, and it honours both like the reality of the letdown and also the resilience and the lesson that it can spark. I think in that way, positivity is at its most powerful. when it's not just used to mask and cover things up, but it's used to help us find the pathway through what we're experiencing. So I want to give you a couple of ways that you can really process disappointment in this kind of healthy integrated manner, starting with this exercise, which is to name and locate the emotion.

When disappointment shows up, when you don't get the job, when someone lets you down, when even small things, like the item you found at the thrift shop that you really wanted, someone bought it before you, like just really small things. Pause and label that emotion directly. I am feeling disappointed because, and then just notice where it sits in your body. It's going to be different for everyone. Maybe it's like a heaviness in your chest. Maybe it's like a pit in your stomach.

Maybe it's like a drop in your shoulders, tension in your drawer. but just by naming it and locating the feeling, you validate it as real, you give it a form, you name that form. This is called affect labeling or emotional labeling. And research on affect labeling shows that this simple act really greatly reduces emotional intensity and helps you stay present with the feeling rather than avoiding it. The second tip I have for you today is called a time-boxed reflection ritual. Basically, you let yourself feel as disappointed as you want for 15 or 20 minutes.

You give yourself a set amount of time, a time-boxed period, just to intentionally let yourself feel disappointed, which is kind of counter to what a lot of people would say you should do, but during this time, you journal, you cry, you simply just think about this thought and this feeling in every possible way you can, you reflect. And when the time ends, you close the ritual by just taking a grounding action. You go for a walk, you do a breathwork exercise, you have a warm shower, you have a cup of tea. This practice trains you to just fully feel without falling into endless rumination.

And it just shows that, you know, disappointment can be acknowledged and move through rather than feared and suppressed. Okay, we've been exploring what it really means to let ourselves feel disappointed. But when we come back, we're going to turn these insights into even greater and even further action. Stick around for more after this quick break. Welcome back. This week we are talking about toxic positivity with the mantra. I let myself feel disappointed. Let's get into our deep thought of the day, which comes from Jonathan Sassad.

Afrin Foa, you cannot protect yourself from sadness without protecting yourself from happiness. I love this quote because it highlights this deep truth that emotions exist on a spectrum, which we talked about through emo diversity, right? You can't selectively numb yourself only to the heart feelings. When we try to protect ourselves from sadness, from disappointment or grief by shutting down, we also dull our capacity to feel joy, excitement, love, surprise. You know, the walls we build to keep out pain don't just block out the difficult emotions. They block out everything.

So in protecting ourselves from disappointment, we do inadvertently create a kind of emotional flatness where nothing makes us feel deep, alive or meaningful. Happiness and sadness, disappointment and elation are two sides of the same coin. you only truly know one because you've experienced the other. To feel the highs of happiness, of surprise, of excitement, you have to be willing to sit with your disappointment at times and with your sadness at times. That's what makes it so precious. It's the contrast with the times where we've struggled or lost

that make it feel so powerful when we do get what we want. So I think what I love about this quote is that it reminds us again to feel and it reminds us that we cannot avoid pain without avoiding a lot of our actually really great things as well. Okay, we've talked about what this mantra means in general and what it has meant for me, but let's explore what it might mean for you with our weekly journal practice. First, can you remember a time when you felt disappointed but tried to hide it? What did that experience teach you about yourself? Next, what disappointment are you perhaps carrying right now that you haven't fully allowed yourself to feel.

And finally, if you let yourself feel disappointed today, how could it influence the way you make decisions or set boundaries in the future? Now that you've kind of made that space to reflect and you've given your mind a moment to rest, let's take a second to just let our mind maybe wander even further. you're going to hear a music track. I encourage you to take this opportunity to just sit with your thoughts, process this week's reflections in whatever way feels right, no pressure, no expectations. And if this isn't something you connect with, I totally understand. And that's totally okay. Just skip ahead about 30 seconds. But as you settle in, keep our mantra in mind.

I let myself feel disappointed. Beautiful. all right as we wrap up this week's episode i want to share a few final thoughts about this mantra i let myself feel disappointed the way i just want to end this is just saying that disappointment is not a bad thing it's not a failure you are not losing the battle against your emotions if you feel an unpleasant emotion that is all part of the human experience there are some things that we are going to miss out on that we deeply, deeply wanted. Wanting things for ourselves, expecting things for ourselves is not selfish, it's not

arrogant, it's not delusional. It's actually an amazing thing. It shows deep self-respect. It shows that you really care about your life, that you want great things from it. I think that that is beautiful. And so when we allow ourselves to feel disappointment at times, we also guide ourselves towards and further towards what we really want from life. and we allow ourselves to acknowledge that as well.

We gain clarity, we gain perspective, and we gain the courage to move forward with intention. That is the gift of disappointment. Thank you for joining Mantra, an exclusive Open Mind original powered by Pave Studios. At Open Mind, we really value your support, so please share your thoughts on social media and remember to rate, review, and follow Mantra

to help others discover the show. For ad-free listening and early access to the show, make sure to join Open Mind Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'll share another mantra with you next Monday. Until then, keep showing up for yourself and your journey. I'm Gemma Spag. See you next week. Mantra is hosted by me, Gemma Spag, and is an Open Mind original powered by Pave Studios. This episode was brought to life by the incredible mantra team, Max Cutler, Ron Shapiro, Stacey Warren Kerr, Sarah Camp, Jen Passavoy, and Paul Liebeskin. Thank you for listening.

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