Archive for: Our Happiness Blog

Do you ever get off track with yourself? Get stuck in a place where you’re just not a huge fan of you? I think we all have some funky place we can slip into when we’re too far from our best self. There are a couple of rumble strip questions I use to help realize when I’m off track and nudge myself back on:

Would I want my kid to see me do that, and how would I feel about truthfully explaining it?
What would I want people to say about me at my funeral, and is that what they would say?

Either one might feel like a punch in your gut if you’re in your funky place. Don’t fret it – it’s the discomfort that accompanies the possibility of change.

Comparison is a tool, and like any tool it can be used to help or to harm. You can use comparison to exacerbate anger, fear, embarrassment, sadness, shame, guilt… and it can also pull you out from the depths of these mucks when used correctly. Example:

You broke your leg on the last day of school. Goodbye pool parties, Capture the Flag, and neighborhood scavenger hunts. You even had to cancel going away to camp with your best friend, which you’d been psyched about for months. It’s only been a few weeks and already you can tell this is going to be the worst and longest summer ever. You are in a totally foul mood in the waiting room until you see a kid your age in a wheelchair that he’s probably been in his whole life. You suddenly feel very fortunate that after this summer you’ll be able to resume your regular activities. In the space of a few seconds you’ve gotten a new perspective on the situation, which lifts the self-pity and puts compassion within reach. While your moms are standing in line you chat with him. He shows you some cool tricks he can do with his chair. You realize he’s a pretty cool kid, and there’s probably a lot to him that he can deal with his circumstances without being in a foul mood all the time.

And with that simple turn of mind you’ve opened yourself to some pretty big ideas about life. Boom.

The closest I’ve ever found to a one-page How To Do Life is Desiderata, a prose poem by Max Ehrmann. There is a bit about comparison in it:

If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain and bitter;
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.

Comparison is a tool often used by people when they’re down or anxious or just don’t feel good about themselves, to gather evidence of their inadequacy or defend against it. Both work against you: if you come out “less than” obviously you will feel bad about yourself. If you come out “better than,” you will fear losing this status so you have to keep aware of whether or not you are still on top. Plus you can’t help but look down on the others you’ve deemed “less than.” Obviously, comparison can be harmful.

And yet… is it always? Is it possible to use comparison to contribute in a healthy way to your life and perhaps others’ as well?

Next week: Happiness and Comparison: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly Part II

Have you ever gotten stuck in the Guilt-Anger Pinball Machine? It’s way less fun than Medieval Madness. It’s the awful place where you keep bouncing back and forth between guilt and anger. You hit the flipper and the bumper and even slam tilt to keep yourself in play between these exhausting negative emotions. Here’s a scenario: You’re visiting your mother, with whom you have a complicated relationship. “There she goes again! She’s always criticizing my life. She’s so unfair – why do I even come?” She hands you an early, very large birthday check because she knows you need the money. “Oh geez. What is wrong with me? She’s always trying to help me like this. I’m such a jerk.” She mentions that you might want to save it for something important rather than spend it on clothes. “What the heck!? She thinks I’m so irresponsible that I’d blow it on stuff I want rather than need? I’m an adult! I can make my own decisions!” At the end of the evening she hugs you tightly, despite your curt responses and rolling eyes you know she must have seen. You tear up.

There might be other Emotional Pinball Machines but this is the one I notice most frequently in my work. One way out is to see the whole picture all the time. When she’s criticizing you (or that’s how you’re interpreting her, anyway) you remember those checks and those hugs. When she’s giving you a fat check you keep in mind that she’s not perfect (after all, she can be critical!). While it might sound horrible to intentionally try to think something rather unkind like that when someone is being generous with you, keeping the whole picture in mind prevents you from thinking of your mom as “all good” and therefore demoting yourself to “all bad” in that moment. Give it a shot, Pinball Wizard.

I usually encourage clients to see the greys in life because things are rarely black and white. Decisions are not right or wrong, people are not good or bad. The truth is generally much more complicated with a rainbow of facts, conflicting thoughts and feelings, convoluted beliefs, and imperfect options. Sometimes we get overwhelmed and just want to simplify. Being able to categorize something into either this box or that box makes life much easier than having to sit with ambivalence and uncertainty. When you feel overwhelmed with a problem sometimes a simple dichotomous question is just what you need. Here’s mine: Is it working? Is how I try to lose weight working? Is how I bring up conflict working? Is how I organize my monthly bills working? If it’s not, try something new. Eventually you will find what works.

This past weekend was the Fourth of July. I walked into the stadium where the town fireworks would be set off and a group of kids pushed past me, excitedly talking about how great the fireworks were going to be. I settled down behind them and their joy during the show was palpable. They were completely in the moment. At the end of the night I walked out after them and heard them reviewing the show – which explosion was the best, how funny it was when there was a dud. They didn’t know it but they were exercising a great happiness activity – savoring joy in three time periods. Positively fantasizing about the future thing, mindfully appreciating the actual event, and then rekindling enjoyment afterwards. Three times the happiness for the price of one! Never pass up a deal like that.

Think about big changes you’ve made in your life. Maybe you ended a relationship or a job, or moved to another town. Maybe you stood up for yourself with a bully, or asked for a raise, or confronted a loved one. I bet at least some of these actions were inspired by emotional discomfort. You felt unhappy in your relationship, undervalued at your job, bored in your town. You felt afraid of the bully, stressed about money, irritated at your loved one. We could argue that even the changes we make because we are trying to move toward something wonderful (current job is fine but this other one would be amazing) are motivated by discomfort – the discomfort that comes from suddenly realizing there is something out there that could make us happier than we are now.

Why is it important to recognize discomfort as a motivator? Because we spend so much of our time trying to avoid discomfort that we sometimes forget to listen to it and use it for what it is: a signal that we need to make a change. Think of it this way: you shift your body sometimes when you’re sitting at your desk or in a movie theater, right? You’re doing that (often without realizing it) because your body is in discomfort. You don’t ignore it because you know if you were to ignore it you would eventually be in pain. So next time you feel discomfort, close your eyes, listen to it, and appreciate it for what it is – a clear and early warning sign of pain.

What do you do when Windows crashes? You reset your computer. How about when your cell phone freezes? Reset! These are called “soft resets” and the idea is that you can get rid of some minor malfunctioning by powering down and powering back up again.

See where I’m going with this?

Everyone could use a soft reset on occasion. Like our cell phones, we can all get in a weird place sometimes where we’re not functioning like we normally do. According to a mobile phone website, these are some things you can fix with a soft reset:

• Not receiving messages. (Read: interpreting through a strong filter like fear, anger, or shame, so that you cannot really hear with the other person is trying to tell you.)
• Cannot receive calls. (Not understanding or responding when other people need you.)
• Cannot make calls. (Not reaching out when you need help.)
• Lag or sluggishness. (Procrastination, feeling down, lack of motivation or energy.)
• Not receiving emails. (Not really hearing what other people are telling you.)
• Cannot send files. (Struggling to express yourself.)
• Incorrect settings. (Waking up on the wrong side of bed or taking work stress out on your family.)
• Responsiveness issues with touch screens. (Not wanting to touch or be touched.)
• Network related issues. (Social isolation.)

When you notice yourself freezing, crashing, or dealing with any of the above, perform a soft reset. Maybe that means treating yourself to a nice lunch, reading on the couch in peace for a few hours, or hitting the basketball court to blow off some steam. Maybe it’s a sign you need to catch up on sleep, talk to someone, practice gratitude, or get some perspective. You never want to treat your cell phone better than you treat yourself, so figure out your soft resets and use them when you feel glitchy.

Imagine this: Your birthday’s coming up in two weeks and your friend has bought tickets for (insert your favorite band/orchestra/comedian here)! With each passing day what are you feeling, thinking, doing? Maybe feeling excited, thinking about how great this experience will be and talking about it with increasing enthusiasm around the water cooler.

Imagine this: You’ve ordered a new gadget. Awesome! And it’s going to arrive “within 14 business days.” Aaaagh! Every day when you come home and see it’s not here yet, what will you be feeling and thinking and doing? You might be feeling impatient or even annoyed when it hasn’t arrived, thinking about how silly it is to have to wait this long, and start your evening slightly bummed.

Research has shown that experiences contribute more to our happiness than things do. We tend to feel excited awaiting an experience and impatient waiting for an item. There’s an element of thrilling mystery when we imagine an experience because we don’t know what exactly awaits us – with things, we tend to know what we’ll end up with. We are less likely to compare our experiences with those of others but we easily and frequently compare our possessions. Also, experiences (and not possessions) are connected to other things that contribute to happiness, like social connection (you’re more likely to socialize on a vacation and not when you’re playing with your new Apple watch) and identity (what adds more to who you are – what you’ve done or what you have?). Experiences can help us connect even after they’re over since people tend to be more interested in hearing about our experience rather than our new item. And finally, we will never struggle with hedonic adaptation to experiences. It’s over and done before we get bored of it. Eventually that new gadget becomes a part of the background (or even obsolete) but that experience you had becomes a set of memories – good memories that stay good and bad memories that morph into good stories.