Is The Journey To Happiness Hyped?

A few days ago, I ran several interviews, and found their responses really surprising.  Well, one person’s actually:

Happiness is overrated… The journey to happiness is hyped.  People should go for contentment… Happiness is temporary.”

And I was floored.  And very, very, curious and interested.

As an interviewer, and a coach, I wanted to know more, and so I asked.

I felt what I heard went against the very core of what I wanted in life: that every one should have the freedom in life, and that they are able to do what they want.

But for this person, let’s call him John, the chains were a better choice.

Sorry John, for calling them chains, because they connote that you don’t have freedom, and I’ve possibly painted your situation as negative.  You have every right in the world to be where you want to be.

For me?  I would never want to be in that situation.

Again.

 

What you want

John said that he’s still in touch with his ex.  They’re still in touch, but they don’t have a relationship.  John told me that it’s hard to look for someone else.

Why not stick to someone who has been with you through ups and downs?  Who has been through life with you.  I felt John missed the person, and wanted to be together again with his ex.

To get back together again, and continue.

Somehow, it made sense to me.

I once thought like John, and believed the same things as John.

 

Hanging on to what I’ve already got.

I once thought, that love and success is scarce.  That what I have is something that I have to fight for, and protect, or else, others will take it away from me.

If other people have success and love, then that means I could possibly have less.

Maybe that’s why John said that the journey to happiness is hyped.  If you think of happiness as a limited thing, something you have to get, and not as something you can give freely, even to yourself, then that journey will be filled with pain, sacrifice, and fear.

The fear of desperately trying to hold on to your happiness and love, and the powerless feeling as they slip away from your fingers despite whatever you do.

So far from the golden path of flowers and love-doveyness that the journey is advertised as.

The journey to happiness isn’t about finding all the happy things.

It’s about learning to be happy despite all the pain, sacrifice, and fear you encounter.

It’s not about hanging on to what you’ve got.

It’s about taking care of, and making more of what you want.

 

Being open to possibilities

It’s easy to get caught up in thinking certain thoughts and beliefs that we’ve learned through our years.

All simply because we haven’t been exposed to the possibility of other mindsets.  Or maybe, even just getting what we want.  All of them.

Maybe, even a simple question of: “Why can’t I get both?  Why can’t I get what I want, fully?”

And like John, for a long time in my life, I was willing to settle.  To settle with what I had been given, and just accept the fact that that was all that I was going to get.

But it doesn’t have to be that way.

 

Dear John,

I support you, and want to keep supporting you in your journey.  I know how true that feels, how sure you are about what you feel, what you think, and what you believe.

I cant blame you, for I was once the same way.  But that same journey to happiness, full of pain, sacrifice, and fear, taught me otherwise.

It taught me that life doesn’t have to be lived that way, and you can essentially choose your own life, despite what the world, and your closest loved ones, are telling you.

And yes, you will be able to find someone who loves you for who you are, and you love them for who they are as well, and not just because you’re afraid you won’t be able to find somebody else.

Love yourself first.  Find happiness in yourself first.

Take the journey of being happy first, before finding happiness in others.  It doesn’t work that way.

You can’t give what you don’t have.

 

Have you ever felt disillusioned and tired chasing happiness?  Please share in the comments below!