What is happiness? Is Happiness overrated? We all know we crave it but ultimately what is the definition of Happiness?
Let’s face it, most of us define happiness in external terms, something we get from the outside. New shoes, a holiday, nice meal, people being kind to you, waking up feeling good, things working out a certain way and when they do that is when you feel happy. Right?
I know I have fallen for this trick and then come crashing down the minute the moment has passed and find myself feeling sorry for myself or seeking then external thing to make me happy. I often find myself using movies and Netflix to decide what emotion I am going to feel, and I can lose myself in the show but as soon as it has finished I kind of feel miserable. Either because the show was sad and it reminds me of sad times in my life or it had a feel good ending but then I am come crashing back down to earth and into my real life and feel emotionally flat.
Therefore, if we continue to rely on external forces to define happiness then we are not going to be happy at all. It will just be a fleeting form of happiness that will not last. Relying on happiness from the outside leaves us up for a fall because we have put the control in someone else’s hands.
Happiness is an inside job and much better to looks at happiness as a product of how we can handle our emotions. If we can focus on our emotional coping skills, then it puts us back in the driver seat of how we choose to feel. This in turn gives us the choice of how to respond and what to focus on which then snowballs to happiness that is more sustainable for longer periods.
Think about it if we wait to see if people are going to be nice to us or wait for all the planets to be aligned for us to get what we want in our career or relationships is like playing Russian roulette with our life. We are not in the driver’s seat of our life and therefore we will often feel like a loser in life.
Have you seen the move The Shawshank Redemption – there is this saying “Get busy living or get busy dying” I believe it means we need to make the most of our life and find the joy as opposed to doing nothing and relying on others and hoping to find joy.
Take back control over your own life and emotions by changing how you see things, get a new perspective, and look within relying on yourself to find your happiness and joy. It is time to make emotions work for us instead of against us. If you are ready to get back in the driver’s seat of your emotions lets chat.