Almost every one of my clients comes to me so frustrated with their life because they “just want to be happy.” They constantly worry about work. They can’t seem to unplug. They don’t feel connected in their relationships. They don’t have time to do the things they are passionate about. And the list goes on.
I’m all for happy, but when it comes down to it, I encourage them to really look at the belief of always just wanting to be happy. When they think about this belief, how does it feel?
Never once has anyone said that it feels good. They never say things like,” It so motivating. I get so excited about my life when I think about wanting to be happy.”
Believing that you “just want to be happy” feels horrible. It’s depressing and makes you think about all the ways you aren’t happy. It feels hopeless and like you are stuck and a total victim to your life.
Logically, if you went around being happy all the time you would never actually know you were happy. In order to know what happy is, you have to know what sad is. If you’ve never felt alone and anxious, you won’t know what connected and peace feel like. If you never feel negative emotions, you never realize when you are feeling positive emotions.
Not only this, but there are things we want to feel bad about. Most people want to be sad when people get cancer and babies die. Most of us don’t want to be happy when someone loses their job or is physically abused.
We don’t really want to be happy all the time.
I’m not saying let people harm you or to don’t take care of yourself. But I want you to think about how your day would go if you gave up the belief of “just wanting to be happy.”
What if you wanted to be mad that your manager is not putting you up for a promotion?
What if you wanted to be frustrated that you work crazy hours?
What if you wanted to feel bad about not spending more time with your friends and family?
If you never felt bad you would be considered a psychopath. So good news; You’re human! These are totally normal feelings.
Next week I’ll tell you what to do now and how to actually start feeling better, but the first and most important step is just realizing and owning that sometimes, you do actually want to feel bad and that’s okay.
Just feeling bad is so much better then feeling bad AND annoyed because you are feeling bad. Let’s start with removing a layer of those negative emotions and just feel bad.
If you want help applying this to your specific situation, let’s jump on the phone and figure it out together. Sign up for a free call at www.lindsaybuchancoaching.com
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