How To Be Happy No Matter What
Stop fighting the current and just let it flow.
“Happiness isn’t determined by the situation you’re in but by how you react to it. Happiness can be found anywhere and its degree measured often only in hindsight. If you‘re not happy right now and it is in your power to do so, change. If not in your power, accept what is and find relief in that powerlessness aware that everything is temporary.”
First and foremost realize that we‘re not supposed to be happy all the time, let that fantasy go. Society tends to convey that if we’re not happy, something wrong needs to be fixed. We are emotional beings which means we are designed to feel, good or bad. I don’t adhere to the idea that any given emotion is inherently good or bad and accept that we feel how we feel when we feel and always with reason. It’s what we do with that emotion that can cause chaos. I’ll give you an example, I do a lot of work in the field of addiction and when I lecture on the topic of processing emotions naturally, I ask audience members to name which emotions they should avoid. Without fail, I immediately hear, “GUILT!”, “SHAME!”, “ANGER!”, “FEAR!”, “REGRET!” and so on. The answer, of course, is NONE. We shouldn’t attempt to avoid any feelings. Without chemical assistance, we really can’t. Imagine never being angry again or acting in a way below your moral standards and not feeling guilt or shame? We wouldn’t change without fear and we wouldn’t grow without regret.
Happiness Lurking Behind Every Corner
“Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass. It’s about learning how to dance in the rain.” -Vivian Greene
That was one of my father’s favorite quotes, he was exceptional in the field of psychiatry and a master of understanding human behavior. I owe him for my knowledge of emotional intelligence, however, I credit life for providing me a better understanding.
In the summer of 2009, I was preparing to enter Federal Prison to begin a ten-month sentence. Fueled by the anxiety of anticipation and the fear of the unknown, it was then that I felt the most, pain, anger, regret, sadness and sorrow. Compared to some friends of mine, ten months of incarceration is time, but it’s nothing to cry about. I’ll share a well-known inside little secret about prison. It’s not the relocating that hurts, it’s the who you’ll miss that matters. We are very adaptable creatures when we need to be so the pain is not in going somewhere else, it’s in leaving those you love. It’s always about the who, never the what.
I actually enjoyed much of that summer and noticed later that it was whenever I wasn’t projecting that I smiled. This would prove a foreboding for what later would be a life-changing experience.
Acceptance
On September 24, 2009, two of my closest friends volunteered to drive to me jail. That was an incredibly long yet ridiculously quick ride. My fear of the unknown progressively became a near panic attack. I think I may have even asked my friend to keep driving to Canada, but he didn’t and that wouldn’t have worked out well anyway.
It was shortly after I was processed for admission while sitting alone for hours in a holding cell that boom, everything changed and I felt peace. It was acceptance setting in. Nothing complicated and certainly nothing new. At that moment, the regret of the past evaporated and the anxiety of a future I feared went dark. Not since childhood was I so focused only on the present. I had become the serenity prayer and it held true to its promise.
I carried this way of being for the entire time I was there and as difficult as it may be for many to believe, it was easy. I no longer felt it was punishment, but a retreat at which time I allowed myself some reflection so as to change and use that experience to help others which I have done personally and professionally ever since.
Instead of attempting to reinvent the wheel, I’ll summarize what helped me by sharing some of my favorite quotes on the topic.
“The greatest learning of the ages lies in accepting life exactly as it comes to us.” Anthony De Mello
“Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don’t resist them; that only creates sorrow. Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like.” Lao Tzu
“Nothing brings down walls as surely as acceptance.” Deepak Chopra.
“Accept — then act. Whatever the present moment contains, accept it as if you had chosen it. Always work with it, not against it.” Eckhart Tolle
“And acceptance is the answer to all my problems today. When I am disturbed, it is because I find some person, place, thing, or situation, some fact of my life, unacceptable to me, and I can find no serenity until I accept that person, place, thing, or situation as being exactly the way it is supposed to be at this moment.” Paul Ohlinger, MD
Accepting life as it comes with all the peaks and valleys that come with it allows us to live in reality. In the end that really is all we truly have. Tipping my cap again to Anthony De Mello, we should not ponder if there is life after death, but if there is life before death, and if so are we wasting precious time on regret and worry trying to change things we simply cannot. We learn from the past to create a brighter future and the only time we have to do so is now.
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