Archive for the ‘unhappiness’ Category

Yesterday’s News

Tuesday, March 26th, 2019

http://www.dreamstime.com/-image691204The story of our Now is eventually Yesterday’s News.

If we enacted even half of our mental patterns—the stuff we do in our heads—out in the real world, we would immediately see a kind of insanity taking place. Here’s one example of what I mean.

Imagine you’ve decided to get a ticket for a highly rated show. You go to considerable lengths to ensure your future experience. You camp out in line for hours, endure freezing weather, and then pay a small fortune for your ticket.

You’ve waited weeks for the big day to arrive, and finally it’s here!

Now, you drive through a snow storm, wait in another long line to get into the event, and endure the occasional rude person before finding your seat. You sit eagerly anticipating a wonderful show, only to discover it’s the worst experience you’ve ever had. Baahhh!

Okay, so you’re hugely disappointed—maybe even a little sad, betrayed, or angry—that THIS PRESENT MOMENT EXPERIENCE is not all that you want it to be. But eventually, not soon enough for you, the show ends. You leave the venue a little older, a little disappointed, but none the worse for wear.

I have a question. Would you—after all of this—eagerly buy a ticket to attend the same event again the next day? I’m imagining your answer is, “Of course not! Why would I go back? That would be almost masochistic!

That’s because no one in their right mind would willingly purchase a ticket to re-experience an unhappy event. And your old ticket will soon wind up in the trash—and out it will go—along with yesterday’s news.

But here’s where it get’s interesting.

Why then, upon leaving the event, do some of us feel immediately compelled to call or text our friends to tell them what a terrible experience we just had? Metaphorically speaking, buying a mental ticket to an unhappy event we only moments ago said we wouldn’t re-purchase a physical ticket to experience again? Clearly, we’re psychically reliving our misery, aren’t we?

And for some of us, for the next few days—maybe even months—we’ll repeatedly re-purchase a ticket by narrating the story of our unhappy experience.

It was the worst night ever! I can’t believe I wasted my time and money! I’ll never go to another show by that group again!

Blame it on GrayBall, The Brain. Our ongoing complaint is GrayBall’s desperate—and totally ineffective—attempt  to make right our past (this should never have happened to me) or defend our future (I’ll never let it happen again).

It fools us into believing that the solution to our unhappiness can be achieved in regurgitating our past—that somehow we can right the wrongs and avoid future failure. So, it takes yesterday’s news and writes today’s, and sometimes next week’s, headline with it.

You see, Brain likes to make up rules that the world should live by. That way it can know what’s going to happen next; it’s a survival thing. Unfortunately, Brain’s version of “how things should be” often conflict with the reality of “how things really are.”

Here’s GrayBall’s logic: “I had a rule for how this was supposed to be. It wasn’t fair that this should have happened to me. Therefore, I need to complain and get people to agree with my point of view. This way I can feel triumphant—as in, I win”—when someone agrees with my self-generated unhappiness. And, I need to reinforce my unhappiness so that I can avoid future unhappiness. After all, if  it happened once, it can happen again; and I wouldn’t like that one bit! Making myself unhappy is my way of reminding myself that I don’t want to be unhappy again.

Poor GrayBall! It can get so confused at times. It believes the only way it can feel “okay,” is to try to correct the past and/or make safe the future.

This is why, when we’ve had a bad experience, GrayBall encourages us to replay it over and over again in our mind. So, we repeat unhappy stories to ourselves and to anyone willing to listen. GrayBall’s reading yesterday’s news as though it were today.

GrayBall’s tricked us into believing that we can make ourselves feel better now and in the future with this crazy strategy. We keep on repurchasing tickets to bad memory shows we would never physically choose to attend again. Because we don’t question this mental habit, we never uncover the truth about how crazy it actually is.

Is this beginning to sound familar? It should. We all do it. We don’t realize we’re buying a mental ticket to unhappiness. By remembering and reciting an unhappy history, we’re reliving it. And GrayBall makes it all too easy to get caught up in our own stories. But nothing changes when you’re reliving it. It’s just the same old, same old—yesterday’s news.

But, take heart. Time doesn’t exist in the way GrayBall would have us believe. It’s simply a strategy that helps us measure the Great Unfolding of Life—in other words, change. There’s no Big Ben in the Universe’s Living Room ticking off the hours. The reality is that we’re carving up the Infinite Is-ness to accommodate our sense of personal history within it.

And—then again—even within our personal history, the past is gone and the future hasn’t happened yet. All we have is Now. And paradoxically, The Now is an eternal constant that is constantly changing. We are in fact on the edge of Creation. This moment—right now—has never in the history of Creation existed before. That is, of course, unless you get caught up in GrayBall’s version of Now, and imagine it’s still  yesterday!

So here’s an interesting perspective shift to consider.

Your What Is will soon become your What Was—a history you can’t change. And once it’s gone, you can only report from it, like yesterday’s news.

Try instead to learn from it. Your past experiences can become an opportunity to make new choices, develop new skills, assume new perspectives, and create new responses. Essentially, you get to rewrite the news of yesterday with a new story line. And that can give you a different kind of history that actually might be worth repeating.

So the next time you find yourself complaining about your past experiences, stop for a moment. Put down that paper and check the date. This moment is the only moment in time there actually is. Otherwise it’s yesterday’s news!

 

 

 

5 Easy Steps for Making Life’s Lemons into Lemonade

Wednesday, September 24th, 2014

http://www.dreamstime.com/royalty-free-stock-images-summer-explosion-color-jumping-girl-beach-image30834709We all know the axiom, “When life hands you lemons, make lemonade.” For sure, that’s sound advice but few of us actually know how to put the sweetness back into a situation once it’s gone sour.

One minute, life is going along just fine and then—calamity strikes. The kids aren’t paying attention, someone cuts you off in traffic, a co-worker undercuts you in front of the boss. You end up with a sour taste in your mouth, wishing you could get back to the sweet life.

It’s easier than you think. Here’s how to turn life’s lemons into lemonade in just five  steps.

Step 1: Look beyond the situation by asking, “What do I think this means?”

You see it’s not the situation itself that’s the problem. It’s the meaning you’re giving it.

Ponder this for a moment: could a problem be a problem, if you didn’t think it was? One man’s problem is another man’s opportunity. How are you making this situation a problem for yourself?

Find out what meaning you’re giving to the situation, because it’s the real source of the sour taste in your mouth.

Step 2:  Once you’ve identified the meaning you’ve assigned to the situation, challenge the meaning.

You can do this by asking, “Is this the only possible meaning this could have?”

Now, if you’re really being honest—and not just trying to be right—you’ll be quickly forced to acknowledge that, in a world of infinite possible meanings, your current meaning is vastly outnumbered.

Your current perspective is not the only one available to you, no matter how justified you feel in keeping your meaning. I know, it’s hard to let it go, so here’s a way to quell the arguments—realize that when you choose the meaning, you choose the feeling and behavior it generates.

Step 3: Pay attention to the feelings and behaviors that are generated when you give your “truth” to your original meaning.

Not very pleasant, right?

Notice that you’re giving your truth to this meaning, you’re not taking your truth from it. This truth is a relative truth, not an absolute one. I say relative, because in the whole of humanity, someone’s likely to see this situation differently than you do.

For instance: getting angry at your child because you’ve given your truth to the idea, “he/she doesn’t respect me,” might feel relatively true in the moment. However, asking yourself what else it might mean gives you an opportunity to look beyond the sour situation being created by your meaning.

You’ll have a better sense for whether or not your relative truth is helping or hindering the situation. Is your original meaning—and the anger and yelling it creates—helping or hindering your ability to communicate effectively with your child? Which bring us to step 4.

Step 4: Ask what you want to experience instead.

In other words, what result are you looking to bring about. Generally, this is the exact opposite of whatever emotion was being generated by the old meaning. This is where you transform anger into patience, frustration into understanding.

Step 5: Find a meaning that’s congruently aligned with a feeling and behavior you want to achieve.

You can do this by asking yourself, “What meaning could I give my truth to—one that would enable me to feel and behave differently?”

Your old meaning is no more true than this meaning. Remember that you’re the giver of truth.

What happens when you sincerely consider this as another possible meaning? However much you might want to reaffirm your old meaning, keep in mind—if you continue to choose it—you’ll be choosing the result it creates. Decide on a meaning that brings about the result you want.

For instance: Deciding that your child is over-tired, over-stimulated, or under-engaged is bound to bring about an entirely different approach to the ‘problem’ at hand. By redefining your meaning, you’ve redefined your resulting feelings and response.

So open up your lemonade stand, the people around you will suddenly like what you’re serving. You’ll find your situation is not so sour after all. In fact, it may get a whole lot sweeter right away.

 

 

The Three Thieves of Happiness

Monday, July 14th, 2014

http://www.dreamstime.com/stock-photos-theif-breaking-burglary-security-image23094233Do you want to be happy? It’s a simple question. Or is it?

One of my favorite reads over the last few years has been The Untethered Soul, by Michael A. Singer.

Singer proposes that there is only one fundamental choice to make in life.

“The highest spiritual path is life itself. If you know how to live daily life, it all becomes a liberating experience. But first you have to approach life properly, or it can be very confusing. To begin with, you have to realize that you really only have one choice in this life, and it’s not about your career, whom you want to marry, or whether you want to seek God. People tend to burden themselves with so many choices. But, in the end, you can throw it all away and just make one basic, underlying decision: Do you want to be happy, or do you not want to be happy? It’s really that simple. Once you make that choice, your path through life becomes totally clear.”

So what’s your answer to this essential question: Do you want to be happy? Yes or no?

Okay, I’m a great psychic. You answered, yes. Didn’t you?

But did you really? Or did you actually answer the question, “Do you want to be happy, when and if?” Because—for most of us—our answer to the first question is really a qualified yes—as in, yes, as long as certain conditions are met first.

And it’s these qualifications that I’ve come to think of as The Three Thieves of Happiness.

So I’ve put out a BOLO—police lingo for be on the lookout—for these three thieves, along with a way to keep them from breaking into your House of Happiness.

Thief #1 — Wait For It, It Won’t Happen Until

This thief has convinced you that you must wait for your happiness. You can’t be happy until you get that job, meet the partner of your dreams, get in shape, or win the lottery. The idea that your happiness has to wait for some future condition has crept in and stolen the happiness right out from underneath your nose.

Here’s how to keep this thief out of your House of Happiness:

Being content or grateful for what you have now is the best defense against this thief.  Even if you want something in your life to change, you can be happy while waiting for it.

Start by seeing the opportunity in your present condition. What you’re presently experiencing is a necessary part of the journey toward realizing your future dream. You can’t get there unless you travel the only road currently available to you.

It might be a little bumpy but it’s going to get you there, nevertheless. Even if you’re at the 50 mile marker on a 100 mile road, you’re on it. And once you arrive, your future dream will be there at the end of it. Just keep moving, and be grateful for the journey. If you haven’t arrived, yet, that doesn’t mean that you have to be unhappy the entire way there. You can choose to be happy. Say only, yes!

Thief # 2 — Only If and When

You’re holding out for a better world—The World According to Me. I’ll be happy only if and when my husband remembers flowers on our anniversary, the kids listen, drivers are courteous, and the current world politics are to my liking. You’re holding out for the world to conform with your rules—your personal preferences, opinions, and judgments.

This thief is the incessant and ludicrous idea that the world and all the people in it must meet all of your expectations of how things should be. You set yourself up with conditions which must be met before you’ll allow yourself to choose happiness. You’re using  your misery to prove a point.

Here’s how to keep this thief out of your House of Happiness:

It’s simple: Stop expecting life to unfold according to your set of shoulds. Anytime you’re unhappy, it’s because you have an expectation of life that it doesn’t have of itself. Saying something shouldn’t be the way it is, won’t change that it IS. Whether you like it or not, it is what it is. You’re being unhappy in an unhappy world doesn’t make it any less unhappy. To quote Dr. Switzer (a.k.a, my favorite comedian, Bob Newhart) , “STOP IT!” You can choose to be happy instead. Say only, yes!

Thief # 3 — The World’s Deadliest Belief (TWDB)

You unconsciously believe: “Other people, events and circumstances are the cause of how I think, feel and behave.”

If ever there was a Master Thief, this one has got to be it!

It doesn’t just steal from your House of Happiness, it pulls it up and takes it away—foundation and all. You can never go home again!

In giving your truth to TWDB, you give it permission to single-handedly steal your sense of control over the responses you have in life. Instead of consciously responding to life, you find yourself in a constant state of knee jerk reactions. This thief doesn’t need to steal your house, because you’re giving it away.

Here’s how to keep this thief from taking your House of Happiness:

Decide for yourself that no one and nothing has the power to make you think, feel or do anything, without your express permission. I finally got this one when a question rebounded in my brain, “who’s the jerk in knee-jerk?” And it was me.

I get that you might not like what’s happening or what other people say and do, but that’s not the cause of your unhappiness. It’s your interpretation—the meaning you’re making up about what it means about you or for you— that’s got your knickers in a twist. Find out what’s missing in your perspective or beliefs that—if you had it—would eliminate your upset.

Work on creating a solution out of the answer to that question and live from it and through it.

Be a chooser, not a loser. There’s no gain in giving away “your house.” Choose to make it burglar proof.

In short, make enduring happiness more important than any circumstance, event or anyone’s opinion and your life suddenly becomes unflaggingly happy.

The Three Thieves might not be happy, but you sure will!