Happiness: Who and What Makes You Happy?

A happy life is not measured by external reference.  There is one and only one measurement of a happy life, the owner’s subjective experience

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It’s both simple and challenging.  Our only impediment to happiness is our own perception – very simple – and yet often very difficult to change.

What you do, how you measure up to others, what others thing of you, how much money you have, how many friends or whatever other measurement you use means nothing in relation to happiness.  Whatever measurement you use, there are many others “better off” according to that measurement who are more unhappy and many others “worse off” who are more happy.

There is no objective measurement of happiness based on empirical evidence.  It is a singular experience that comes down entirely to your attitude.

I’ve struggled with this myself.  Society wants to convince you happiness is “out there,” either through the accumulation of accomplishments or the new status symbol – “experiences.”  But a big bank account or lots of awards or lots of stamps on your passport does not lead to happiness.  Nothing outside of you will lead to happiness.  Happiness comes first before the enjoyment of other things.

And whether you realize it or not, you have haters.  There are people you know and people you don’t know who have a personal interest in seeing you unhappy.  They will go to every possible length to convince themselves, everyone around them, and (if they can) you that you are miserable, for whatever reasons they can come up with.  Because they’re unhappy and can’t figure out why, so they resent your happiness.

How dare you be happy when they have more money, or more friends, or a “better” job (whatever that means), or better “life experiences.”  If they’re miserable with their “superior” lives, then you can’t possibly be happy and, as haters, it is their job to show you that you aren’t happy, you’re just crazy.  Or settling for mediocrity.  Or brainwashed.  Anything they can get you to grab on to.

And “they” represents not just your personal haters (and you have some, everyone does), but the larger society that desperately wants and needs you to be unhappy, to be constantly reaching for something else to feel fulfilled.

Even people who claim to have your best interest at heart are playing this game.  Often your biggest fans are also your biggest haters. 

This is one of the main reasons I walked away from the “personal coaching” modality.  All the coaches I’ve seen, even the ones I personally like the best, operate from this model of unhappiness.  They sell their services from the place of “you are unhappy, you are unfulfilled, so TRANSFORM YOURSELF and you can be happy like me.”

As someone who has spent a LOT of time and money on coaching, I can tell you happiness will not be found by “changing yourself.” 

That’s actually a bold statement that runs directly against every coaching pitch I’ve seen.  So let me repeat this so it sinks in:

There is nothing you can do to “change yourself” that will transform you from an unhappy person to a happy person.  The only way you will move from unhappiness to happiness is to choose to be happy.  Everything else you do to make yourself “better” is just another form of status-seeking that won’t bring happiness. 

Now, that’s not to say happy people don’t seek to better themselves, they usually do. But there’s a big difference between improving on a happy life and trying to be happy through change. 

You don’t need anything that you don’t already have to be happy. You don’t need to improve your social standing, or performance, or anything else.  Being happy can happen for you right now.  The poorest person with the least “going for them” can be happy, and often are. 

Waiting for your haters to “come around” won’t do you any good.  Haters are gonna hate.  Consider them your reference point for unhappiness.  I have haters.  Some are people who feel hurt by things I’ve done in the past and, instead of letting it go and just being happy, have chosen to hold on to their wounds and cheer for my failure and unhappiness. 

Others are people who believed deep down that “being the best” would bring happiness and can’t understand why that isn’t working for them.  They have to constantly show how their lives are “better” than mine and expect me to feel bad.  I don’t.  I’m happy for them.  Which seems to just piss them off even more.  Which makes me a little less happy for them, since they’re obviously not happy people.

And there are a ton of people I know who aren’t haters, but they’re not happy.  They’re desperately trying to be happy, to look happy, to get by and hoping somehow this elusive happiness will find them.  That’s most people – maybe you too.  They image-craft on Facebook and Instagram, talk about their awesome life, and you get the sense they are one bad break away from a complete meltdown, they’re just barely keeping it together. 

You Don’t Need to “Do Something” to Be Happy

The “status symbol” now among first-world people is “experiences.”  How many pictures of “stuff you’re doing” around the world do you have on your social media?  How many stamps in your passport?

Those things are nice, but they aren’t a measure of happiness.

I’ve done a lot of things in my life.  I’ve had a wide variety of experiences, good and bad.  A lot. And I can tell you it’s not the “what” it’s the “how” that matters.  If you’re unhappy and taking a lot of vacations, all you do is take your unhappiness with you everywhere you go.  I know people like that – very unhappy people but they’re always going somewhere, usually trying to run away from themselves.

Conversely I know others who do very little and yet they’re very happy.  Some of the happiest people I’ve ever met are poor and never traveled out of their province, much less the country. 

I hear people say “do what you like” to be happy.  The truth is, it’s more about liking what you do.  Changing the “what” just changes the scenery around your unhappy state, but you can’t run away from you.  On the other hand, if you adopt a lifestyle of happiness, you can find good in any experience, even the most mundane. 

This is one of the lessons of Buddhism.  When you stop, slow down and meditate, you’re not “doing anything,” yet it is here one can find self-acceptance, happiness in other words.  People who meditate are happier, even though they are “doing” less than others. 

You can have a series of “adventures,” running from one thing to another, and never get much from any experience.  And you can have a handful of experiences but experience them deeply because you’re centered and not “trying to be happy.” 

Nobody Else Can Make You Happy (or Unhappy)

I had to mute all the coaches I know because their marketing is all about “hire a coach to be happy.”  Which won’t make you happy, just more likely to get sucked into their funnel and spend a LOT of money “trying” to become happy.  Unhappy people spend a lot of money trying to be happy.  First world problems.

It’s bullshit.  A coach can’t make you happy.  If you’re already happy, a coach can help, but if you’re not, you’ll likely just be unhappy with a coach.  And the harsher truth is most coaches aren’t happy.  They’re still “trying” to be happy and imagine themselves further along some “path” to happiness.

There is no pathway to happiness.  It’s a way of being.  Nobody else can give it to you or show you the “pathway,” you have to accept yourself and choose to be happy.  There’s no other way.  There’s no “graduation” to happiness.

Conversely, nobody else can make you unhappy.  Haters are gonna hate.  Whether you choose to listen is up to you.  Some people are mean.  Everyone has a bad moment.  Whether you choose to absorb those slights is entirely your choice.  Bad things happen.  Whether you choose to keep going or let them stop you is largely up to you.

I have a friend who has an anniversary for every bad thing that’s happened in their life.  And some of those bad things happened a GENERATION ago.  But this friend (who I’m considering de-friending) chooses to keep commemorating those things on the calendar and bringing the past into the present (and only the unpleasant stuff too).  I can’t even relate to this way of being, but at any rate, this is a choice to keep inflicting pain in your life.  You can let things go, even bad things.  It doesn’t mean you’re dishonoring people or disregarding past trauma, you’re just choosing to heal and focus on the here and now. 

And here and now, whatever bad thing that happened in the past is not happening now.  It’s over.  It’s not actually happening to you now.  By choosing to relive the past, you’re re-injuring yourself when you could just as easily forget it and move on without the pain.  Stop torturing yourself with your past and let it go!  Nobody is “making” you torture yourself, YOU are doing this ONLY to yourself.  Only you.

And that’s the bottom line of happiness – it all comes down to you.  It’s a choice you make in every moment.  It is a practice learning to un-learn the habits of unhappiness, but in the end it’s just a choice.  Nobody and nothing can take that choice away from you.  It’s you and only you.