“How can you mend a broken heart?” the Bee Gees famously asked in the 1970s. The answer to this question is the same as the answer to the next question in the song: “How can you stop the rain from falling down?”  You can’t. Feeling sadness after you lose someone that you love is as natural as water falling from the air after it has condensed into drops. You simply have to open to acceptance and wait for it to pass.

Unfortunately, many people don’t want or know how to do that, as I’ve observed over my years of offering counseling to Las Vegas couples and individuals. To shield themselves from uncomfortable emotions, people may bury themselves in work, throw themselves into exercise or partying, or numb themselves with drugs and alcohol – anything to keep grief at bay.

The trouble is, that doesn’t work. Like other emotional traumas, a broken heart needs to be acknowledged. Healing requires attention and patience. If you deny yourself this process, the cause of the pain goes untreated – even though it may be temporarily forgotten – and so the pain will return again and again.

When I see clients suffering from a broken heart, the first thing I do is let them know that it is okay to grieve. I also encourage them to be gentle with themselves, to consciously create a comforting space in which they can tend to their sadness. Rest, a short vacation, certain foods and music are examples of things used to create such a space.

Then, we can begin to examine the particular aspects of each situation. Some broken hearts are complicated and require significant counseling, exercises and homework to get to the cause. Others are fueled by deep wells of emotion that take time to drain. Hypnotherapy is an excellent tool for working through grief, and it may be part of the plan each individual client and I will work out together.

As you face the daunting task of mending your own broken heart, the most important thing to know is that it cannot be put off. Although it may seem hard to believe at the time when you are hurting, the day will come when you can open your heart to others, trust again, love again and – as the Bee Gees said – “live again.”

Consider this all-too-common scenario: Alice calls her friend Carol to tell her about the great job she just landed. Instead of giving the congratulations Alice expected, Carol responds, “Wow, it must be nice to be off unemployment after so long.”

Sound familiar? This is an example of passive aggressive behavior. I encounter it frequently in all types of counseling situations, from couples therapy to addiction recovery. Chances are, you’ve had a brush with it too.

If you have, then you know how difficult it can be. For the victim, passive aggression feels like falling for a dirty trick – a mean sentiment veiled by a seemingly innocent remark or action. For the aggressor, it can be just as bad, fueling the fire of negativity that caused the remark or action in the first place.

Dealing with passive aggression is easier than you may think. The key is to understand where it comes from. Often, people have unknowingly taught themselves to behave passive-aggressively over many years as a defense mechanism.

For example, if open displays of emotion were discouraged in your home, you might have grown up learning to hide strong feelings. Over time, however, these feelings will find a way out. When your blood is boiling, you have to let off some steam. For someone who has developed a habit of controlling him- or herself, this can mean saying or doing something that seems acceptable on the surface, but vents a negative undercurrent of emotion.

The news of Alice’s job might have caused Carol, who is out of work herself, to feel like a failure by comparison. The happiness Carol likely feels for her friend is drowned out by the unpleasant hiss of feelings of inadequacy seeping from the pressure-cooker of her self-control.

When I see this happen, either in individuals or between couples, I try to find ways to get to the root of it, then past it. Individual counseling, marriage counseling and couples therapy all provide a safe environment to explore and defuse the strong feelings and habits that are at the root of passive aggression. Hypnotherapy can also be a useful tool, in cases where a client needs to look at unconscious motivations.

Once we find the source or sources of passive aggression, it becomes much easier for you to identify and deal with the behavior as it happens in yourself or someone close to you. After some practice, Alice might be able to respond, “I’m sorry you haven’t found anything yet. Do you feel like celebrating with me anyway?”

Ultimately, this is a much happier and more productive ending for both participants in the scenario than slamming down the phone and feeling angry. The friendship remains intact, Alice sends the message that passive aggression doesn’t work, and Carol gets a chance to correct her behavior.

Isn’t that the kind of resolution you’d like for yourself?