One of the keys of living a happy life is found in the phrase, "Expectations are premeditated resentments". We talk all the time about how we expect someone to do this, or expect them to say that (whether in business or personal lives, it's the same), and when they don't, we get angry, hurt, depressed, etc.
While I could have a whole post dedicated to just that concept, and how dropping expectations in general and turning to something other than expectations can help you be happy (and I just might do that at a later time), I am thinking specifically about the time-based element of life. When we don't get what we want when we want it, it creates a whole new experience. Even if we get what we wanted later, that experience can be tainted by the resentment built up by not getting it when we wanted it.
Being willing to accept where we are at in life and any progress towards goals as worthy of celebration brings true happiness. Patience is the essence of being willing to wait for wonderful things. We may never get the wonderful things we wanted in the first place (just ask any infertile couple who wanted children of their own), but that's for another post on gratitude.
Someone who is patient is able to look forward with anticipation to a future event without an expectation attached to a certain timeframe. I may like it more if I get it sooner, but at the end of the day, I am satisfied to wait until it comes. Patience does not imply fatalism, or encourage sitting around and waiting rather than working hard towards a goal, it simply is an acceptance of the time factors outside of your control.
There are so many things in life that we desire, and we get a very small amount of these at any given moment, so an impatient person will see all the unachieved belongings or events or what-have-you with building resentment rather than focusing on the wonderful things they have right there. Happiness is resisting resentment, and accepting the timeframe that life imposes through patience. Patience grants peace of heart in spite of disappointment due to temporal complications.
Patience spares us stress while waiting for what we want in life. Doing otherwise spoils our happiness in the present moment.
Current mood: patient
Showing posts with label being happy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label being happy. Show all posts
Thursday, April 12, 2012
Wednesday, April 4, 2012
Being Happy - Accepting Emotion
Emotion drives everything we do, and I do mean everything. Logic is important, but logic itself has no power to bring us to a new place and create change. Just look at all the people who are dying of heart disease that know they need to change their diets in order to live, but refuse to do so. Logic says, "Eat right or die", and they respond with, "I care less about dying than I do about eating whatever I want, whenever I want."
In other words, logic only moves us when we care enough to move on it.
I saw a sci-fi movie once (not giving the name to avoid spoilers - those who have seen it will know what I'm talking about) where the characters land on a planet that has dead people just sitting in cars, at desks, lying on the street, etc. No violence was committed anywhere. They discover that the government of the solar system was experimenting with a drug to make the population more docile, but it succeeded so well, they were stripped of all emotion. They literally starved to death, knew they were starving to death, but simply did not care enough to do anything about it.
If we were stripped of emotion, we would do the same. Unfortunately (or fortunately, rather), negative emotion brings a lot of pain. Who likes to feel betrayed or depressed or angry or sadness or grief? All of these emotions are unpleasant, but what's more, when they hit, our brain shuts off and we lose some of our higher thinking functions. Fight or flight literally pulls blood from the brain and into the heart, and so we make stupid mistakes. The things we say when we are angry are almost always not things we would say when we were calm. Arguments and debates are often lost by the person who lets their emotion get the better of them.
Our reaction to negative emotions are often to clamp down on them, hard. We don't want to feel those things, so we do our level best to bury them deep enough that they rarely push up into conscious thought. However, this approach also removes our ability to feel joy and happiness. Emotion is emotion, and if I reject the hard and painful emotions, I also reject the profound and enjoyable ones. Addictions often emerge as a substitute for genuine positive emotion - pleasure certainly feels good, but it is hollow, lacking the ability to make us a better person.
Not that we should swallow our negative emotions whole because that would be akin to burning my hand on the stove and not removing it. I feel pain because I am damaging myself in some way, and negative emotions provide the same warning - we are doing/saying/thinking/believing something that is damaging to us, and it needs to be solved. But when I accept the role that negative emotion brings to the table and use it as impetus to solve my problems, I also open the door for true happiness, love, gratitude, and the whole host of positive emotions to reign in my life as well.
If I cut off negative emotion because I don't like suffering, I compound my suffering, for I also cut off true joy.
In fact, when I accept the proper role of negative emotions in my life, as symptoms of a deeper problem in me that needs to be fixed, then I am driven towards deeper and richer happiness in my life.
If you want to be happy, accept the role of emotion in your life, painful and joyful both.
Current mood: happy to be sad
In other words, logic only moves us when we care enough to move on it.
I saw a sci-fi movie once (not giving the name to avoid spoilers - those who have seen it will know what I'm talking about) where the characters land on a planet that has dead people just sitting in cars, at desks, lying on the street, etc. No violence was committed anywhere. They discover that the government of the solar system was experimenting with a drug to make the population more docile, but it succeeded so well, they were stripped of all emotion. They literally starved to death, knew they were starving to death, but simply did not care enough to do anything about it.
If we were stripped of emotion, we would do the same. Unfortunately (or fortunately, rather), negative emotion brings a lot of pain. Who likes to feel betrayed or depressed or angry or sadness or grief? All of these emotions are unpleasant, but what's more, when they hit, our brain shuts off and we lose some of our higher thinking functions. Fight or flight literally pulls blood from the brain and into the heart, and so we make stupid mistakes. The things we say when we are angry are almost always not things we would say when we were calm. Arguments and debates are often lost by the person who lets their emotion get the better of them.
Our reaction to negative emotions are often to clamp down on them, hard. We don't want to feel those things, so we do our level best to bury them deep enough that they rarely push up into conscious thought. However, this approach also removes our ability to feel joy and happiness. Emotion is emotion, and if I reject the hard and painful emotions, I also reject the profound and enjoyable ones. Addictions often emerge as a substitute for genuine positive emotion - pleasure certainly feels good, but it is hollow, lacking the ability to make us a better person.
Not that we should swallow our negative emotions whole because that would be akin to burning my hand on the stove and not removing it. I feel pain because I am damaging myself in some way, and negative emotions provide the same warning - we are doing/saying/thinking/believing something that is damaging to us, and it needs to be solved. But when I accept the role that negative emotion brings to the table and use it as impetus to solve my problems, I also open the door for true happiness, love, gratitude, and the whole host of positive emotions to reign in my life as well.
If I cut off negative emotion because I don't like suffering, I compound my suffering, for I also cut off true joy.
In fact, when I accept the proper role of negative emotions in my life, as symptoms of a deeper problem in me that needs to be fixed, then I am driven towards deeper and richer happiness in my life.
If you want to be happy, accept the role of emotion in your life, painful and joyful both.
Current mood: happy to be sad
Friday, March 30, 2012
Being Happy - Enthusiasm
I noticed an interesting thing not long ago. Part of living a happy life involves being enthusiastic about the things we love, right? Well, there are two ways to generate enthusiasm:
In other words, I constantly find reasons to be enthusiastic about things, either now or in the future, and it makes me happy. I teach new contractors coming into the Service Desk to do tech support for our clients, and I tell them that while being a contractor does really stink because of the lack of benefits, they have a wonderful opportunity in front of them to do something they really love after just a year or so. When the job gets tough and it feels like they are slogging through each day, anticipate something wonderful, and they'll perk right back up!
Anticipation is a fabulous attitude to help us get through hard times. What is Christmas Day without the anticipation for it through the month of December? My anticipation over moving into our new house gives me a huge smile and a bounce in my step. It's gotten me through a lot of trials.
Anticipation - one of the big secrets to daily happiness!
Current mood: Anticipatory
- Do something you love.
- Anticipate doing something you love.
In other words, I constantly find reasons to be enthusiastic about things, either now or in the future, and it makes me happy. I teach new contractors coming into the Service Desk to do tech support for our clients, and I tell them that while being a contractor does really stink because of the lack of benefits, they have a wonderful opportunity in front of them to do something they really love after just a year or so. When the job gets tough and it feels like they are slogging through each day, anticipate something wonderful, and they'll perk right back up!
Anticipation is a fabulous attitude to help us get through hard times. What is Christmas Day without the anticipation for it through the month of December? My anticipation over moving into our new house gives me a huge smile and a bounce in my step. It's gotten me through a lot of trials.
Anticipation - one of the big secrets to daily happiness!
Current mood: Anticipatory
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