How to Find Happiness

What if our true nature, our most authentic self, were blissfully happy? What if all those times we've been upset, down or agitated were just the result of mental constructs that we invented and accepted as real?

(photo by D. Sharon Pruitt)

And furthermore, what if we could adjust our thinking so that when we felt tense or upset we could change our story so that we felt really good again? This is what Dr. Srikumar Rao suggests in his new book, Are You Ready to Succeed?

It sounds like this could be a fun game. Think about it. Every time life throws you a curve, you swing in a more effective way. By effective, I mean in a way that creates less irritation and more joy. Your boss tells you he needs you to fly out to the West coast tomorrow and ease a crises. Your mind leaps into a frenzy of thoughts. You think about the preparation you’ll need to do while packing a tight suitcase all evening. You think about the cramped airplane, the lonely hotel, and, of course, the tension you’re likely to face when you confront the crises. You worry you will fail.

So what might Dr. Rao suggest?

He will probably tell you to come up with an alternate reality--one that you can believe. He’s not big into positive thinking, in part, because, he says, if you do not believe the platitudes you are telling yourself, then you are wasting your time saying them. In other words, he wouldn’t suggest you tell yourself that the trip will be a blast and that you will come back feeling energized because all that would be too unbelievable to you. What he might suggest, instead, is that you think about the trip as a challenge. Though it may not excite you, it could be a good chance to learn something new about how to better serve a customer. This, in turn, could be good for your career. If you begin to feel better as you apply the new thinking to the situation, then you, he says, are on your way to finding more peace and lasting happiness.

Martin Seligman, researcher and author on finding happiness suggests, ironically, that happiness comes not from inventing alternate stories as much as from minimizing the damage of a perceived negative event. Happy, well-adjusted people seem to have a knack for taking a universally stressful event and minimizing it. How do they specifically do that? According to Seligman, in one of three ways.

1. Happy people do not take whatever happens personally. They do not blame themselves. Stuff happens to all of us. Accidents happen. So do mistakes and events sometimes spiral out of our control. The pessimist says, “It’s my fault.” Not the optimist.

2. Happy people do not make an event pervasive. It does not have to effect every area of an optimist’s life. The spouse may leave or the stock market plunge. So what, they think. This is just one small facet of an otherwise happy life. The event is minimized. The pessimist, on the other hand, dwells on the event much more and thinks about it effecting every part of their life.

3. The optimist realizes the negative event is not permanent. It will all be over one day. Or as my father has been fond of saying for decades, “This too shall pass.” So far, he has never been wrong.

Just think about it for a moment. What if we had this amazing place inside us--full of joy--barricaded off by our own erroneous or at least ineffective thinking? And what if we could unleash some of that joy just by adjusting the stories we tell ourselves, by minimizing the worst parts, so that the joy inside us could bubble up instead of the toxic thoughts? Rao says, if we are willing to try this, we would, over time, find ourselves happier and more aligned with who we really are. That’s not bad. In fact, it might even change your life.

Hurdling Over Hassles

Have you ever thought, "I want a better life?"

It all seemed so much easier once..., in the womb. Now life's full of annoyances, inconveniences, hassles and struggles. How can we expect to be happy with all that frustration? And that's just the first layer.

Today I was noticing all the things I had to complain about. I woke up with my nose stuffed up from a cold. One of my dogs is sick and threw up for the seventh and eighth time last night. I woke up at 5 am to take care of him, though he may need an emergency vet visit later today. I think he ate the weed killer I spread yesterday. Who knows? The other dog peed on the floor. Of course, both wanted attention at the same time, and I didn't feel like giving it then. I had more important things to do, like getting to the grocery store to pick up breakfast and a mop.

So, did the hassles stop when I jumped into the car? No. I glanced into the mirror and saw I had not shaved nor combed my unruly hair. Then I realized I couldn't see though the car windows. The cold night had frosted them. I rolled the windows up and down hoping to clear them but that didn't work, so I had to get outside and wipe them down. After I missed a couple of traffic lights I always make, I got to the grocery store and grabbed a small cart in the parking lot and wheeled in from outside. I soon realized the handle was way too cold, and felt fortunate to discover a warm handled cart inside.

Quickly though, my good fortune turned (and I mean that literally) when I realized that the warmer cart consistently pulled hard right. I thought at first I had developed an equilibrium problem. In addition, my right arm, working hard to keep the cart straight, began to ache. Was I having a stroke? In fact, I nearly knocked down a poor women using a cane. A left-handed bowler would have liked the hook action and the spare gained by knocking the cane (and Grandma) over. Everyone else would have been appalled. Fortunately, I kept yanking left and just missed her. The Kroger staff thought I had a really bad tic problem. No one suspected the cart. I just lowered my head and weaved it down the next aisle.

Okay, so this is a typical weekend day. Things did not go exactly as planned. Hassles abound. Today it was the cart and dogs. Tomorrow the cable will go out before the final-four game, and the sick dog will feel well enough to dig a hole halfway to China in the back yard. Life happens. You're going to get a headache, even a migraine once in a while. You are going to be yelled at by some mean-spirited women who didn't like your knee in her back when you sat your long body into a cramped theater seat and realized too late that sitting normal would have required you to buy two $70 tickets so that you could (semi) comfortably drape your legs over the chair in front of you. You still might have knocked into the patron two rows forward.

What else? Your car window will stick, just as you are pulling up to the drive-in window. The guy at the window will yell at you to come inside to pick up your meatball sub. You will hit your head for the twenty-third time on the too-low car ceiling as you step out and have to ask someone to read you the twenty-third psalm right then before you lose consciousness and die.

This is life. It just is.

And that's my point. If you really believe your life will or should be hassle free, then please start a travel agency with low-price tickets back to the alien world you came from. We'd all like to travel there. Today. However, if you plan to stay here on earth, you will have a highly predictable amount of hassles that come and go randomly pretty much every day. You will also be hit with some more difficult ones. Hang in there. Face them with agility.

What do I mean, "Face them with agility?" I guess what I'm saying is that you can face these pretty much unpredictable-predictable hassles in a couple ways. One is to get upset, to blame, complain or throw a tantrum (inside or out--it doesn't really matter), or you can leap over them without really breaking stride. I mean, think about it. Say you're a hurdler coach and your best runner decides he or she is just going to plow into the hurdles and then make a big fuss when he or she halts to a painful stop. What do you tell him? Aren't you going to show him how to sail over the hurdle with speed, power and agility. Aren't you going to tell him to take a few steps and sail over the next one and the next one all the way to the finish line? Because there are going to be hurdles to spring over or to trip over, depending on your agility level. Here's a hassle, sail over it. Here's another, now leap. Drive forward, go. No whining, no complaining, no "woe is me," and no outbursts--just calm, assertive power. Pure mental agility. Your serenity still intact. Your life smooth and dynamic. Wow! Blissful,isn't it?

I'm impressed. Others will be too. The first level conquered, the level of natural, expected hassles hurdled like a pro. Once this happens, you will be ready to take on level two, the hassles you have created and have sustained despite thinking they were not your fault. You will pour your energy into tearing down those brick walls later. For now, just enjoy the predictable-unpredictable hurdles that are sure to come your way spontaneously, no matter what. Expect them. Note them when you see them. They make life a little more interesting. Then leap over them like an Olympic athlete. No big deal. Everyone, including you, will be glad you did.