Get Out of Your Own Way: How We Sabotage Our Happiness Part 3

Hello dear readers….here is part three of my musings on getting out of your own way…enjoy!

Not Knowing Ourselves/Being True to Ourselves

Interestingly, a lot of us don’t really know ourselves all that well, and what we truly want out of life.

Or, some of us have a pretty good idea, but deny it. Some years back, you had a vague (or super-strong) sense, but never really explored it further for one of a million reasons like being discouraged from taking a certain path by your parents , or thinking what you wanted wasn’t’ realistic.’ So, you got on another path never to look back.

For others, you might have had an ideal vision of your life, you began pursuing it, but you slowly got off track, until you had morphed into someone else completely. The desires were just getting pushed further and further down. You kept telling yourself you would change course, but that day never came.

One of the biggest problems contributing to these two issues is the conditioning we receive over our lifetime that implants ideas of what we should want and what should make us happy, and the results are often disastrous.

We get so brainwashed by the ‘shoulds’ we don’t even stop to think whether we actually want any of these things, or we go to great lengths to convince ourselves we do because that seems easier than going after what we really want; or conditioning is so deep we may not ever give any thought to what we want at all, and just follow the herd.

We take the job with the prestige even though we hate it because having a fancy job title, and making a lot of money, is part and parcel of being a success; we marry the person who looks perfect on paper even though we know he isn’t the right one for us; our primary concern is ‘fitting in’ and not doing anything that would make us a target for criticism, judgment or gossip.

If the stirrings within lead us really astray from what everyone else is doing, it is easy to think there is something wrong with us, but there is nothing wrong with you. There is no ‘right and ‘wrong’ there is just preference.

Over time, the true us gets smothered, but she is still alive and kicking– her displeasure manifests in all sorts of unpleasant ways, like anxiety, depression, feeling lost, yearning for a sense of purpose, and just a general sense of unhappiness.

This lack of clarity about who we really are has makes us highly susceptible to molding our lives based on the opinions, beliefs and arbitrary declarations of others. We do things based on what someone else has deemed ‘right’ or ‘appropriate.’ We end up living someone else’s life, and by time we realize it, we feel we are too deep in the hole to reverse course.

When we really take the time to know what we want and who we want to be, we feel much more confident in doing whatever it is we need to do to achieve this vision. We are less afraid of being ‘different’ or ‘standing out.’ The questioning and criticisms of others carries less weight because we know we are doing what is right for us.

So, if you have yet to give some real thought to who you are and what you want, I couldn’t think of anything more important for which to make time. For those of you who have been denying who you are, make a promise to yourself you will change this. Think of one thing you can do today to move towards the life you want and the person you want to be—you can’t create a new life overnight but you can certainly change direction immediately.

Putting Off Happiness Until We Get (Insert Desire Here)

This is a tough one. We don’t need anything to be happy; we can just be happy at any moment we choose. Having done a lot of work on myself over the years, I have come to realize the truth of this statement—it is definitely not my default setting, but I’m working on it.

But, most of us have a lot of ‘stuff’ we need to work through, and just deciding to be happy right in this moment probably won’t work. Who we are in this moment does not really resonate with this nugget of wisdom. And that’s okay.

But, having said that, one of the biggest ways we sabotage our own happiness is putting it off until some indeterminate point in the future when we will have finally gotten something we want, whether it is the better job, more money, a relationship, dropping that weight or a million other things.

We let our ‘issues’ from the past weigh us down, and affect every aspect of our existence.

We focus on all that is ‘wrong’ with our lives, and feel like shit; we determine we can’t possibly feel better until our experience changes. Now, like I had mentioned in part two of this series in the section about gratitude, there is nothing wrong with wanting more out of life. We are meant to grow, change and experience.

But, with a shift of perspective, we can start feeling better now, even in the absence of all the things we believe are ‘necessary’ to feel better about ourselves and our lives. We can start feeling happier even if we haven’t totally released the pain of our past—we just have to be willing to slowly release these anchors as a part of our identity.

Start focusing on the good in your life—this sense of gratitude can produce a tremendous shift.

Think about what changes you can make in your life that would help you feel better—you may have to start small, and that’s okay. Just commit to doing something.

Start focusing more attention on the little things that bring you pleasure throughout your day—really tune into the emotions when they surface. They will get stronger over time, and more and more of your day you will be in a better mental space.

Realize that feeling good now will bring good things into your experience without you doing much more than shifting your mood.

Fear of Being Selfish

The fear of being labelled ‘selfish’ can make for a very unhappy life. The word has a really negative connotation attached to it, but when I think of this word in its pure form, it means ‘acting in your own self-interest.’ There is nothing wrong with doing that, so long as your actions are not truly hurting other people.

And by hurting, I mean really hurting them, like endangering their well-being, stealing from them, cheating them out of what is rightfully theirs…you see what I’m getting at. If you are ‘hurting’ people by making them upset because doing what you want interferes with what they want, that is a whole different ballgame.

You are not doing anything wrong; you are not really hurting anyone. These people are getting upset because they would rather your actions be in line with something that is of benefit to them. Hey, you can’t really blame them—we all prefer when things happen to our liking. But, when they accuse you of being ‘selfish’ they are flat-out wrong, no two ways about it.

Other people can’t hold you responsible for their happiness, nor can you place the same expectations upon others. This can be really hard to put into practice. The idea our decisions are making others unhappy can be really uncomfortable, but always keep the aforementioned litmus test in mind to determine whether you are being the bad ‘selfish’ or the good ‘selfish.’

What do you want to do that you haven’t been doing because you think it is ‘selfish?’ What could you do to shift this perspective? What steps can you take to bring this desire into your reality? Do something today to move you towards it.

So, another series ends, and I hope that what I shared here and in the previous posts gave you some helpful advice about taking back control of your happiness, and working to create more awesomeness in your life.

I would love to hear your thoughts on this subject–how are you self-sabotaging? What have you done to successfully end the cycle?