Stop Forcing the Silver Lining with Dr. Risa Ryger

Lisa Cooper Ellison [0:00]
Well, hello, Dr. Risa Ryger. I am so excited to have you back on the podcast for a very important conversation we’re going to have today.

Dr. Risa Ryger [0:10]
Welcome. Thank you so much, Lisa. I’m thrilled to be here and really grateful to have this opportunity to speak again on such an important topic.

Lisa Cooper Ellison [0:21]
Well, I just want to say that I am a huge fan of what you do. You have these amazing Instagram Lives—your Disruptive Conversations—and you always have fabulous guests. I’m going to link to a couple of my favorites in the show notes. You also have this beautiful Self-Owned Mindset that you’ve created.

People have already heard the official introduction of you, right? So, you don’t have to give us that. But what I want to know is: What would you like us to know about you today as we have this conversation?

Dr. Risa Ryger [0:54]
Oh sure. Well, a couple of things. One is—and I think this is so important for everyone to know, regardless of where you are in your life—that positive change can happen at any point in time. You’re never too late.

In order to create positive change, we need to disrupt. If you do the same thing, you get the same thing. And the Self-Owned Mindset is really the space where we neither fall into being selfless nor selfish. It is the space where we unapologetically and very clearly own all of who we are. It’s through that lens that we can go forth in our lives in ways that are deeply connected to ourselves and really feel the ownership of who we are.

But what’s also very important—it’s not a “but,” it’s an “and,” actually—and what’s also very important is that it positions us to powerfully be in relationships and be available for the interdependence that happens in connection and in relationship.

Lisa Cooper Ellison [2:05]
That is such a beautiful and succinct description of what you do. And listeners, I’m going to link to the other conversation I had with Dr. Risa Riger so you can listen to what she shared there. We’re going to be deepening that conversation—not repeating it—today.

One thing I want to say is that as I was looking through your Instagram this morning—I always like to see what someone has posted most recently—you had this beautiful clip of you speaking on stage about the importance of really owning what you deserve. You deserve to be heard. You deserve to take care of yourself. You deserve to honor your needs and what is happening inside of you.

And that’s part of what we’re going to talk about today as we dive into an issue that I’m just going to say is a bit of a pet peeve for me. It’s something I sometimes work toward, but I also have a lot of issues with. And that’s the idea of silver linings.

It’s not that silver linings are bad, or that we should never look for them—but there are problems with that. We were talking about a few of those problems before I hit the record button, and you had some really articulate things to say about it. So, I’m going to pass the baton to you. What would you like us to know about your opinion on silver linings and why they can be problematic?

Dr. Risa Ryger [3:33]
I’m going to start with this: silver linings can be beautiful, yes—but not when they become blindfolds.

What does this mean? What’s critically and crucially important is that we are able to acknowledge our own experience. Yes, when we talk about silver linings, what’s embedded in that is the notion and experience of optimism.

But optimism—true optimism—doesn’t happen through avoidance. Optimism isn’t about not seeing. Optimism is about seeing—being able to acknowledge, identify, and not invalidate yourself.

So when we’re looking at “What does silver lining mean?”—and we’ll talk more about that—it’s crucial that we acknowledge, identify, and allow ourselves to experience what’s really going on inside of us, even, as you mentioned earlier, when that’s contrary to what other people may want us to do or how they may want us to show up.

Lisa Cooper Ellison [5:02]
Yeah, I love that you said that, because I will say that I am generally an optimist. There’s something in my disposition that naturally moves in that direction. But because of some of the things I’ve been taught—and also the ways I’ve been treated, especially when my brother died by suicide—people were really able to attend to me in the very short period after his death. But soon it became, “Why is this still a problem? Why can’t you get back to life?”

When I couldn’t feel optimistic about my own experience, especially when I was younger, I would think, Something’s wrong with me. Why do I feel bad? Why can’t I see the great things ahead? Why am I hurting so much?

And it was because I had those blinders on. I wasn’t able to look at my own experience.

A couple of things brought this to the forefront. My friend’s husband recently died, and she’s been going through hell—that’s the best way to put it—trying to attend to her dying husband and love him through an illness that progressed very quickly. And people said things, as they do: “This is all here for a reason,” and “It’s God’s will,” and all the really bad answers we give because we want people to feel better—but really, we want ourselves to feel better.

Then I had another email from someone with a chronic illness that’s not going to get better. And the question becomes: How do you deal with the fact that there’s a life you really want to live, and it may not be accessible to you anymore?

So, there are the stories we tell ourselves and the feelings we have, and then there are the things other people say to us that complicate the issue and make it difficult to see ourselves and our experiences clearly.

Dr. Risa Ryger [7:11]
There’s a lot in that. I want to pick up one thread for this moment: the idea that “everything happens for a reason.”

What does that mean? There’s this illusion that if you just trust that everything happens for a reason—or if you can identify the reason—then it will be better. We’ll then not feel what we feel. And that’s just not true.

Not everything happens for a reason. We can see how something happened—someone gets ill, someone is in a car accident, a child falls and suffers brain damage. We can understand the circumstances. But that doesn’t invalidate what we experience.

The quid pro quo embedded in the phrase “everything happens for a reason” suggests that if we accept this idea, then we’ll feel fine.

Part of why we struggle with this harkens back to early childhood. Very early childhood. When we feel something, we don’t have a sense of time. We don’t have perspective. We can only perceive what we could perceive then. And so, what we feel seems like it will last forever.

That’s one reason children become so frantic or adamant—they cannot imagine an end point. If you’re hungry, you think you’ll be hungry forever. If you’re angry, you think it will never end.

So, when we go into emotional spaces that are difficult—sadness, anger, grief, loss—or even for some people, happiness and satisfaction, those spaces can feel dangerous or worrisome. These feelings live in our bodies, not just our minds, and our bodies enter a state that feels uncomfortable or even panicky.

That can activate those very old fears: Oh my gosh, am I going to feel this way forever?

Here’s where optimism comes in. Optimism is acknowledging: “I may not know it now, but I am not going to feel like this forever.” That doesn’t mean I’m never going to feel sad again.

And we aren’t only talking about death. We can feel sad about not achieving in the way we hoped, about not getting a promotion, about not being in a relationship, or about a relationship ending.

Optimism is acknowledging what’s true and holding the sense that: I’m feeling this way now, but it doesn’t have to be forever.

Lisa Cooper Ellison [11:30]
I love that, and it makes me think of this writing exercise that Laura Davis taught me, which is: This is how it is right now. If you can sit there and just be with how it is right now, that can allow you to hold space for yourself. You don’t even have to shift the experience.

And the reality of emotions is that they’re going to change—because they will. Does that mean you’ll never feel sadness again, or that there won’t be a tinge of grief underlying your experience? No, you likely will have that. But there is a way these things shift.

And I heard something recently, and I’m curious to hear your thoughts on this.

I heard recently is that there’s a difference between emotions and feelings. Emotions are the physiological experiences we have in our bodies, and feelings are the stories we tell ourselves about what’s happening.

So, you know, we can have a physiological experience that could be either excitement or fear. Sometimes the story we build around that internal state is based on past experiences or our associations. And we can build a story that’s either like, “Yeah!” or “Oh no.” And that story can complicate things for us.

Dr. Risa Ryger [13:23]
Well, it is the nature of the brain to try to make meaning of something. What you’re talking about is acknowledging what we’re experiencing physiologically, right? The pit in your stomach, your heart beating faster, the heaviness in your chest. There are so many sayings—“my heart sank,” “my heart took wing”—that match our internal experience.

Then there’s the aspect of the brain that likes to make sense of things. When we start to attribute a story to that emotional experience, we may not be able in the moment to change our physiological response. And in fact, what’s so important is that the body knows before the brain.

Your body language was your first language. When we were what I call “micro humans,” our bodies were really where everything happened. Because our left hemisphere isn’t fully on board yet, our first language is the language of the body. We see ourselves reflected back through the people around us—people who are concerned, thrilled, joyful about seeing us, or not.

So, this identification of what’s happening in you—what I call self-literacy, the ability to read your internal experience—is so important. Then comes deciding how to make sense of it, make connection for yourself or not, and understanding what that does for you or to you.

And of course, what we tell ourselves about ourselves is what our brains learn. Then we’re in a loop, with physiological experiences reinforcing the story we’re telling.

For example, if you have a disappointment—say, a work-related disappointment—you might think, “Gosh, I’m just not successful,” and then start going back in time to revisit all the moments you felt unsuccessful. That doesn’t have to be the end of it. You can get mired in “I’m not successful, and look, I have all this evidence,” and then jump to “I will never be successful.”

But an alternative is to say: “That wasn’t successful. What can I learn from that?” That’s different from the silver lining. It’s not “Well, the good part is…” but rather, “What do I need to see more clearly? Is there something useful I can take with me?”

That’s very, very different from trying to find a positive spin. And why should we feel obligated to do that?

Honesty comes first. Hope comes next. Yes.

We have to be clear about what we’re experiencing so that, if hope resonates, or optimism, or seeing a different path, or taking action—or not taking action—we can identify that within what’s meaningful to us.

When we do not acknowledge our feelings, we go into avoidance mode. We try to jump over our own experience. And what we know from science is that even if we’re not acknowledging our feelings, what’s happening to us is still happening.

There can be a lot of physiological responses. Someone asks, “How are you?” and you say, “I’m fine.” But if you were hooked up to a galvanic skin response monitor or another instrument tracking biological processes, you’d likely see a very different story.

In that moment, what’s happening isn’t optimism—it’s self-abandonment. And that’s the opposite of what we want with the Self-Owned Mindset. What we’re unaware of can continue to affect us, but because it’s outside our awareness, it’s unchanneled and not within the boundaries of how we can work with it or use it—perhaps even in service of optimism, or figuring out what success looks like, or determining the story you want to tell yourself.

Lisa Cooper Ellison [19:23]
Yeah, I love that. And what I’m hearing is that part of what you need to do is step back and create some distance between yourself and the experience.

So, one thing I heard you saying is: “Oh, I’m not going to be successful,” versus “This wasn’t successful.” That’s part of the honesty piece—recognizing, “Oh, I have a story I tell myself about what these things mean. Can I step back and look at it differently?”

And that doesn’t mean setting the feelings aside. Because as you said, there’s this yoga phrase: what you resist persists. Right? If you try to push it away and pretend it’s not happening, it’s not just that it stays—it can become stronger and show up sideways. It comes out in different, unexpected ways.

So, being able to step back, check your language—How much ownership am I taking? How much am I making this part of my identity?—and then pulling back to look at the experience a little more objectively and ask, “What can I learn?”

Because you can learn from an experience, and it can still really, really, really suck.

Dr. Risa Ryger [20:44]
Absolutely. And you can simply say, “This was really awful. Period.” You don’t have to turn it into something else. And that doesn’t mean you’re not being optimistic.

There are a lot of emotional, cognitive, and internal spaces we’re capable of inhabiting simultaneously. So, if you’re saying, “This was really awful,” that doesn’t mean you’re not optimistic, and it doesn’t mean you’re going to stay in that place forever. It’s simply an acknowledgment—an honest assessment of your experience.

That doesn’t make you this or that. If someone asks, “How are you doing?” you can say, “I just had a really hard time, and I’m not back from it. I’m not on a different path yet.”

This idea of bouncing back is something we need to be very careful about. The notion that if I’m having an internal struggle, something is wrong with me. But no one says struggling is easy—and no one should say that struggling is inherently bad, or that one should not struggle.

We can struggle through something in order to gain better understanding. We can struggle to get ourselves to the next whatever that may be—the next level, next idea, next relationship. Struggle in and of itself isn’t to be avoided, nor is it necessarily avoidable.

Obviously, struggling to get food or meet basic survival needs—that’s entirely different. We’re not talking about that here. And it’s important to be respectful of that level of experience.

When you’re, for example, with your friend whose husband had a fatal illness—there’s struggle there. You can struggle to do your best, to give your best care, to help someone have their last days be meaningful, the best possible. Struggle in itself is not the enemy.

The problem is this illusion that things should go smoothly, like sliding down a slip-and-slide. That’s just not how life goes. But it doesn’t mean you’re doing it wrong.

And the idea of bouncing back—bouncing back without replenishment, without insight, without connection, without support—is unsustainable. Yes, there are moments when we have to bounce back. That’s the reality sometimes. But long-term? It’s not sustainable.

Many women fall into the idea that, “If I were more resilient, I’d be able to handle this.” But that’s just not true. Resilience alone is inadequate, and resilience can become its own trap—this belief that, “I don’t need replenishment. I just need to get back to it.”

And then with silver linings—this idea that, “It’s my job to find the silver lining,” or “My growth depends on it.” No, it’s not your job. What is important is that you’re able to read yourself, acknowledge your experience, make meaning from it, and draw from it whatever is useful—if anything.

But it is not incumbent upon us to continually find silver linings. That doesn’t make us better people. It’s not the only path. And it doesn’t mean that if you don’t do that, you’re a downer or a pessimist or you’re stuck.

You don’t have to accept anything that doesn’t feel accurate or reflective of your own experience.

Lisa Cooper Ellison [26:08]
I love the way you’re validating all of this, and how you’re talking about the different words and language we use—like “bouncing back,” “snapping out of it,” “hurrying up and getting well,” or “getting back on track.” These are phrases that give us the sense that change can—or should—happen quickly.

A word I prefer to think about is evolution or evolving. Because when I think about evolution in science, it wasn’t something that happened quickly. Change happens over time. And in many situations in our lives, that’s the truth of the process.

I think back to 2012, when I contracted Lyme disease and was sick for seven years. And let me tell you—those seven years felt like ten forevers. It felt like it was going on and on. Because the inflammation in your brain creates this very specific kind of anxiety and depression, and I had to contend with that in addition to having a body that felt awful and not understanding what the path forward would be.

During that time, I often felt like I was doing it wrong because I couldn’t will myself to get well. And it’s only in retrospect that I can see the real question: What was the piece I could control at that time?

It was: “How do I feel about myself? What story am I telling myself right now about my experience?”

Sometimes evolution—especially when a situation with our bodies is not going to get better—means learning to love ourselves and accept ourselves as we are. That was part of the journey I went on.

And I say thank you every day that I did get well, because I know not everyone does. We can evolve in whatever way we’re meant to, while also acknowledging: “Yeah, this is really tough. I would not wish it on anyone.”

Dr. Risa Ryger [28:35]
And that’s where optimism comes in. We know that in many respects, optimism is very different from depression.

So, we have to be careful here—what we’re talking about doesn’t exist in one form on a single continuum.

For example, when the silver lining narrative arrives—“It’s so great that that relationship didn’t work out, because now I’ve met this person”—well, okay, but we don’t need to go to the silver lining. We can find meaning, yes, and that’s important.

But we also need to ask: Where am I on the continuum?

Avoidance will get in your way. If you’re finding that you’re going into avoidance—not optimism, but avoidance—it’s important to recognize that.

And depression is not pessimism. Pessimism can be a symptom of depression, but depression itself is not pessimism. Depression needs attention.

You can be saying, “I’m great, I found the silver lining,” and still be depressed. Everyone around you might think you’re doing well, but that doesn’t mean you’re being well.

That’s where grace, ownership, validation, and our worthiness as human beings come in—to be able to acknowledge our own experience. And actually, doing that can help us get to optimism.

You can’t jump over your experience. That becomes its own form of avoidance.

Lisa Cooper Ellison [30:54]
Yeah, and Brené Brown says that if you mute one emotion, you’re actually muting all of your emotions. So, if you’re avoiding the things that feel uncomfortable, you’re also limiting your capacity to access the other emotions at the level you might otherwise be able to.

Dr. Risa Ryger [31:13]
I want to add to that, because you’re bringing up a really important point. When we go into avoidance, the message we’re sending ourselves is: I can’t handle this. I can’t manage this.

There’s a big difference between that and: I don’t know how to do this—let me get some help. I’m feeling overwhelmed—I need support to bring this down. That is very different.

Avoidance tells us we can’t trust ourselves—that we don’t have the confidence or the competence. And that sets us back. Because if you can’t trust yourself… then what?

Trust can sound like this: I trust that I don’t know how this is going to go, and I’m not sure I can do it all. However, I can get help. I can give it a try. I can acknowledge this, and the next step is to begin working it out.

The trust you develop in yourself comes from acknowledging what’s there. If you’re not seeing what’s there, you start to lose trust in your own perception. You begin wondering, how could this have happened? How did I miss this?

Trusting what you see—trusting what you experience—creates the foundation you need. And it’s essential for real confidence. I’m not talking about being inflated; I’m talking about internal confidence that becomes part of the foundation of who you are.

Does that foundation falter at times? Of course. But it’s still a foundation—something you can return to. And that’s where the Self-Owned Mindset comes in. It doesn’t mean your life is free of struggle. It means you have something stable to come back to.

Lisa Cooper Ellison [33:51]
I love that. And talk about disruptive, right? Really disrupting the message we give ourselves—that if we’re pushing things away or rushing to make something better, then we must not have what it takes.

I’m going to be sitting with what you just said for a while because it’s brilliant. And I think it’s so important to reframe things this way and say: I trust my capacity to be with this, and I can get help to make sure I’m able to do so.

That’s something I had to learn during a period of really deep, intense depression. I couldn’t do it on my own. I did need help—and fortunately, I had access to it. Access is a crucial piece—not just asking for help but being able to receive it.

It’s okay for people to hold space for us during those times. But the more we can tell ourselves, I have the capacity to be with this discomfort. I trust my capacity to consider my options. I trust my ability to see what’s actually happening, the better.

And as we’ve been saying, that is so different from creating a silver lining.

Dr. Risa Ryger [35:25]
Yes. And silver linings can happen. Where does the idea come from? From looking at a cloud with light shining from behind it—it’s beautiful. We can admire that beauty.

But that doesn’t mean we’re required to find a silver lining at every step of our lives. It doesn’t make you a better person to find one every time something happens, and it doesn’t make you a worse person if you don’t.

If you’re not finding joy or beauty anywhere in your life, that’s something that needs attention—because it may indicate an inability to see where things need care: your relationships, your health, your relationship with yourself.

Saying, “It’s great, it’s fine, everything’s fine,” when it’s not—that’s also a disservice. Because then you’re not allowing yourself to see what is. And you can only add a helpful narrative after you’ve connected with what’s true.

Lisa Cooper Ellison [36:53]
Yes. So really giving yourself the opportunity to assess: Am I able to access joy in my life? Am I able to feel pleasant or positive emotions?

And if not, okay—what do I need to do about that? Not forcing yourself to feel something you can’t access right now.

Because I agree with you—when silver linings have happened in my life organically, they’ve been amazing. And I love looking at clouds and thinking: Look at the beauty. Look at what’s possible.

But yes, there are times in our lives when accessing that isn’t possible. And we don’t have to force ourselves into a particular perspective.

That’s really the big takeaway from this episode: we can accept it all, and we can trust ourselves along the way.

Dr. Risa Ryger [37:55]
Yes, and we have the opportunity to trust what is empowering. To empower ourselves by seeing what’s actually there.

When we’re able to see what’s there, we can assess and determine what we want to do—whatever that may look like.

This is not passivity. This is meaningful action. And action can take many forms: not doing something, thinking something through, taking a step, making a change.

At the same time, we’re being in truth with ourselves as best we can in the moment. Awareness can be one of our greatest powers.

And awareness is something we can learn. It’s not either “I have it” or “I don’t.” You can become aware of what you were not aware of before.

That’s empowering. It puts you in a space of agency. It builds self-trust and confidence—even for the days when you want to see the lining but can’t. Maybe not today. Maybe another day. But the lining will be there at some point.

Lisa Cooper Ellison [39:39]
Well, we could continue this conversation for the next ten days because there’s so much here. And Risa, I could listen to you forever—I really could. You have so much wisdom, and you are so generous.

Listeners, if you want more, go to her Instagram page and listen to all of her Disruptive Conversations. She has so many incredible ones, and she does so much else in the world. So, if people want to learn more about your work, see you at an event, or connect with you—what are the best ways for them to find you?

Dr. Risa Ryger [40:18]
You can visit my website. I’m on LinkedIn and Instagram. You can DM me—I’m thrilled to connect. That’s what this is all about: offering and inviting people to take more ownership of who they are and what they want their lives to look like in real time.

Lisa Cooper Ellison [40:46]
Listeners, all of the links to Risa’s social media will be in the show notes, along with her website. And thank you so much for being here. It has been an absolute pleasure. And like I said earlier, I’m going to be thinking about the things we discussed today for a long time. Thank you.

Dr. Risa Ryger [41:04]
Thank you so much, Lisa. And I, too, will be thinking about our conversation. It doesn’t end—it doesn’t end when the recording is off.