Our minds have a picture perfect. If we are unhappy when people or events don’t match the picture, it may be easier to change the picture
Workers installing new phone lines in our neighborhood ruptured a 30 inch water main that served 300 homes. It was a mess. No water, a muddy road, loud jack hammers at night, and cars parked a mile away because the entrance to the neighborhood was closed. The neighbors who gathered around the gushing hole in the road had varied reactions. Some saw the event as humorous, and joked with the workers and each other. Others were fascinated by the equipment used to locate and replace the broken pipe. A few whined about having no water at home. And a group of angry people considered suing the phone company. We all suffered exactly the same inconvenience and disruption. How could we have such a wide spectrum of reactions? The answer is that we each had a choice to be jovial, curious, complaining or angry about the broken pipe, and we made different choices. None of our reactions helped fix the water main, but the reaction we chose determined our happiness for the 48 hours it took to complete the repairs.
Is it possible to be happy about every change? If we were happy all the time, could we understand happiness? The concept of happiness requires that we simultaneously understand events and people that we associate with unhappiness. That understanding makes it easy to regain happiness when we are unhappy. Just embrace the dragons of regret, disappointment, worry, frustration, fear, anger, depression and other emotions that we label as "unhappy". Whenever we are unhappy about a change, enjoy the feeling, get whatever benefit there may be in the unhappiness, and switch to happy quickly. Get over it! The alternative is to feel bad about the change, and hope that feeling bad will produce happiness. Some people make that choice often, and are consistently unhappy as time after time they resist the dragons of desperation, disappointment and frustration. Fighting the dragons must help them feel better. If you do not enjoy being unhappy, choose to be happy today no matter what changes may seem to get in the way of your picture of happiness |
