Internal wounds

I'm at this place in my life where, I just want things to be... better... you know?  I want to better myself.  Better my health, my home, my relationship with my husband, my family, my friends.  Just better everything.  I don't want to be in a life dragged down by negativity anymore.  I don't want to be tired, or lazy, or angry, or hurt.  I don't want to let the small (or even the big) things get to me.  I don't want to let the hurts that come my way eat at me like they do. 

That's the crux of the issue for me though.  I keep doing these things to make myself and my life/world "better," but there's that Momma Bear part of me that takes even the smallest slights, the smallest cuts that someone else can give me, and turns them into the deepest and longest lasting wounds.  I allow people to make me feel like a villain when I never was one.  Even when I know in my head I might not deserve it at all, my heart might not let me believe it.  Those wounds and beliefs get into my head, and take over my thoughts and get into the places that my positivity is supposed to be, and they take root and grow until something strong enough to knock me out of the funk happens, which usually is The Beard doing something incredibly stupid just because he knows that I need it, or the grey cat sensing I'm sad and being extra sweet that night.  I take things so personally, even when I shouldn't.  I can't help it though, I think it's the protector in me, or something. 

Maybe it's still the always-made-fun-of chubby girl that internalized everything.  Maybe it's just that I care about people too much, often much more than I care about myself.

Whatever it is, I know it's something (else) that I need to work on.  But how do you work on trying to care LESS?  Or maybe not trying to care less, so much as trying to allow fewer things to hurt you, or effect you as deeply? Maybe I need to get back to meditation and/or yoga, I've been thinking about doing that anyway.  Clearing out the apartment and getting my studio/craft room set up so I have a space to go to might help too.  Maybe I just need to live in a bubble.

What do you do to help get rid of melancholy or negative emotions that are pulling you down?  I'd really love some help with this, it's an issue I'm honestly tired of struggling with, and I'm just not a bottle of wine/pint of ice-cream/drown your sorrows kind of girl.