Sometimes being happy takes courage. Sometimes we get so comfortable experiencing a less than happy mood because it’s best not to expect too much or get let down. We like what’s familiar. We can settle into unhappiness and forget how to feel happy. When you’re unhappy you can even distort a happy memory and say, ‘Oh I only thought I was happy’. But being happy is easier than you think. Remember a time when you felt really happy. It could be the start of a new relationship when all you can think about is how wonderful the other person is. How many times a day do you think of that person and experience a rush of happiness? Thinking about that person makes you feel good and so you repeat the experience again and again firing off those happy anchors. But when was the last time you generated these good feelings just for the fun of it? We all know what it feels like to be happy but we don’t bring back these good feelings without an excuse because surely we need a reason to feel happy? No, we don’t.
Happiness, like all feelings, is contagious. “No, it’s not”, you might be saying,” I can be perfectly miserable even if I’m with a happy friend”. Now, tell me how you feel when you’ve spent time with someone who complains about everything and anything and is determined to see life in a negative light. Do you come away happy? I doubt it. And then think of a time when you’ve been laughing with a friend and you’re still in that state when you speak to the next person you come across and you take happy thoughts with you and then the next person you meet picks up on these happy thoughts and experiences them too. Your outlook on life will change with your mood, as the Bard said ‘there is no good or bad but thinking makes it so’.
A friend of mine who had been having relationship difficulties told me how she wanted her partner to take the initiative and arrange an evening out for them both. All day she would imagine the many reasons that this wasn’t likely to happen and as the day went on she got angrier and angrier as she continued an imaginary argument with him in her head. By the time they finally met up later after work she would be so angry and resentful that she could barely speak to him. No surprise to know that he wasn’t then in the mood to take her somewhere nice! Fortunately, with help, she resolved the situation by making a shift. Instead of having imaginary arguments with her partner during the day she remembered all the things she liked about him until by the end of the day she was really looking forward to seeing him. What you focus on increases. She couldn’t have been more delighted when he whisked her away to Paris for a weekend because ‘he likes to see her happy’.
My friend didn’t ‘pretend’ that she was feeling happy, she just focused on what she wanted instead of what she didn’t want. I’m not advocating that you cover up emotion with positive thinking. Feelings and emotions need to be accepted in order to move on and masking feelings with words will not work. It’s far better to repeat the affirmation ‘I accept myself exactly as I am’ than spitting ‘I am happy’ through gritted teeth when you are clearly not. Accept that you are unhappy at that moment and that it will pass. What you resist persists. Resisting and denying feelings of sadness or anger will just amplify those emotions.
Another way people deny themselves happiness is to put it off. ‘I’ll be happy when I’ve lost a stone’ or I’ll be happy when I’ve finished this job, get the car, go on holiday’. Why wait? Have you ever been in a situation that seemed quite appalling and thought ‘I’ll laugh at this one day’? Why wait?
Change your thoughts and you change your life. Your thoughts become your reality. Think about a time when you felt really happy – and do more of that!
