I’d be ticked

“How do you do it? What’s happened to you isn’t fair. I’d be ticked-off.”

Recently I came across an old friend I hadn’t seen since Shelly’s passing as I shopped at Wal-Mart. As I saw him (and he saw me) he looked at me and quickly headed straight towards me.

“How you doing?”

“I’m doing real well. How are you?”

Then he looked at me a bit deeper… paused and then said, “You ARE aren’t you? You ARE doing good.”

“What do you think?” I said.

That’s when he said it. “Dang, Dude… How do you do it? What’s happened to you isn’t fair. I’d be ticked-off.”

The quick conversation got me to thinking. Why am I doing well? I’ve got every right to be struggling right now. If at any time in my life, I could ever describe my situation as “not fair” or I could reasonably claim to be “not doing well” now would be that time.

So… why?

I mean… I’ve faced my fair-share of tragedy in my life. I’ve got nothing extravagant to hang my hat on. I’m pretty average financially, my family is the average everyday family, I look like most other 50+ year-old dudes. I’m probably what most might consider, well, by all accounts… I’M AVERAGE.

The more I thought about it the more I’ve decided it’s fairly simple.

I DECIDED – a long time ago – to be happy.

At one point I worked with a lady who had decided to be unhappy. When she’d come in – almost ALWAYS late (and she had some seriously CRAZY excuses) – she’d sit down, express her discontent with her job and pay and then proceed to either complain because a) she had nothing to do and was bored; or b) she was too busy and overworked.

It didn’t matter if her day was full of productive work or empty of ANY work, she was unhappy. I also noticed she had an inordinate amount of sickness, an inordinate amount of people she disliked, an inordinate amount of problems, an inordinate amount of family issues, an inordinate amount of paranoia, an inordinate amount of… well, you get the idea, huh?

It seems her complaining had become a habit. And I’ve never met a happy complainer. Have you?

It got me to thinking. Is being happy a habit? Is being unhappy a habit?

Awhile back I had a chance to interview a guy that expressed to me that he had spent his whole life striving to achieve specific financial goals with the idea that as soon as he did, he would achieve happiness.

Surprisingly, this guy also expressed that as he achieved each financial goal, he found that happiness was not there and needed to seek the next financial goal, only to find that as he achieved each new financial goal, there was always more to do.

Needless to say, this individual was and is an unhappy (and wealthy) high-achiever.
And guess what? I HAVE met plenty of bitter and unhappy high achievers.

Then there was Coco. A young man I met when he was about 14 and quite a few pounds overweight. Coco was determined to lose the weight and eventually did. Here’s what Coco had to say about his experience…

“For those of you who have the goal to lose weight, look good, dress to impress, etc., let me clarify something, if you’re doing it as a means to gain acceptance, receive attention, fill that empty void, or be happy, you might want to step back and re-evaluate your intent and the company you surround yourself with.

When I was overweight, I thought that if I could just lose the weight and work my butt off, it would change everything, so I did, I lost the weight and put on some muscle, and guess what?! It didn’t fix the main problem! Was I healthier? Yes. Do I look better now than I did then? Yes. But it didn’t buy me real authentic relationships, it didn’t fill the void that I that I “thought” was being caused by my looks/weight.

It didn’t result in happiness.

So if you want to lose weight, build muscle, reach fitness goals. DO IT FOR YOU! Do because you want to be healthy, because you want to perform better, sleep better, learn about the human body, do it because it’ll teach you to reap the rewards of sacrifice and hard work. But do not do it because you think it’ll make you friends or save your relationship. Value the ones who are there regardless.”

Is Coco saying losing weight didn’t change his level of happiness? Or address what he THOUGHT would make him happy? I’ll have to ask to be sure, but I think Coco seems to understand that “things” or “accomplishments” won’t reward you with happiness. Happiness SEEMS to be a habit.

Let me share with you an interesting concept called “Cognitive Confirmation Bias” in reference to your happiness.

Cognitive Confirmation Bias is the idea that people will search for and find new information and interpretation in a way that confirms what they believe and avoid information and interpretations, which contradict what they believe.

Say you believe you’re good at basketball. When you play well you tell yourself, “Of course I played well, I’m good at basketball.”

When you play poorly or are overmatched by better players, you tell yourself, “Well, I just had a bad day. That was an abnormality. That bad basketball player is not REALLY who I am.”

You see, we are always on the lookout for evidence that supports our beliefs (and we ALWAYS find it – because we’re actively looking) and we IGNORE evidence that is contradictory to what we believe to be true. If we IGNORE contradictory evidence, it simply ceases to exist and our beliefs are safe.

Think about how that can help us.

If we ARE happy and grateful, we will LOOK for and FIND things that “confirm” that thought and rationalize other (bad) events as abnormalities. If we are unhappy or miserable, we will LOOK for and FIND things that make us unhappy and miserable and maybe ignore or rationalize HAPPY events.

That idea just sucks to me.

The bottom line is this. Happiness is a habit. So is unhappiness. The good news is happiness BREEDS happiness. The bad news is, UNHAPPINESS breeds UNHAPPINESS.

Start today to decide to be happy. Look for and find reasons to be happy and grateful. They are everywhere, no matter your circumstances. Believe me… I know.

Make it a habit to look for and focus on the good and wonderful things in your life and watch as you DEVELOP the happiness you deserve.

Shelly is/was famous for saying…

Happy, loving people live in a happy, loving world. Hostile, angry people live in a hostile, angry world. SAME WORLD.

What world are YOU living in.