Finding Our Happiness Flow. Dr. Robert Ph.D. Puff PhD
What does bring happiness is enjoying today, enjoying right now, enjoying the journey of our life. On the other hand, what can keep us from enjoying our life’s journey is that little phrase, “Someday I’ll be happy”—“Someday I’ll be rich and then happy” or “Someday I’ll be successful and happy” or “Someday I’ll find the love of my life and be happy.” It’s not wrong to have goals and to work towards them. But our goals shouldn’t keep us from living life and doing what we love right now. We can do both.
I know not everyone has an ideal job, but since we spend so much time doing work, there are ways we can enjoy it a little bit more. If we’re a stay-at-home mom, let’s do things that we enjoy and not make everything about sacrificing for our kids. If we go to a job that’s laborious, one that’s hard on us, let’s find a way to enjoy it. Let’s enjoy our lunches, let’s enjoy the people we work with, and let’s bring things that make our work better and more pleasant for us. Whatever we are doing, let’s enjoy it to the fullest, instead of saying, “Someday I’ll enjoy this.”
None of us knows how long we have on Earth. There are absolutely no guarantees with life. Of course, we don’t want to live so fully that we end up becoming homeless and not working. That would be silly. However, it’s a matter of finding that balance. Let’s enjoy what we do while we work. That’s the key to whatever we’re doing in life. The relationship we’re in, can we make it better? The job that we do, can we improve it? A little bit of improvement over time can drastically affect our overall life. When we meet people like Lisa, who passionately love what they do, we realize that happiness isn’t always about how much money they make. It’s far more about doing what they love, loving what they do, and loving life. That’s the secret of happiness—loving life now and not “someday.”
I know that sometimes we’re in very difficult situations in life. We may be in prison; we may be diagnosed with cancer; we may be unemployed. Many negative things that can happen to us. But even in those challenging times, there is always something beautiful to be with. Be with that something beautiful. Yes, work towards remedying the negative that’s going on, but when we’ve done our part, then we need to relax and just enjoy what is. There’s always something beautiful to be with; let’s be with that.
Here are the key elements.
1.We just don’t know how long we have to live, so let’s not put off living fully today in the hope for a better tomorrow. Let’s live today to the utmost.
2.Let’s always realize that, no matter what’s happening, there is always something beautiful to be with.
If we believe these two things, then we’ll look for and find these beautiful things to be with right here, right now, even with the challenges we face in our everyday life. The important thing is to live now and stop waiting for “Someday I’ll . . .”
“Someday I’ll . . .” may never come. But if we enjoy the journey of our life and work towards our goals, what will happen is that, even if we don’t reach them, we will have a good life.
Chapter Ten
Finding Happiness by Flowing with Life
Part of finding happiness in our lives means that we have to understand who we are, where we stand, what our nature is, what our interests and passions are, and then making these part of our lives.
For example, I love nature, I love being outside, but my work as a psychologist normally occurs inside. So when I get up in the morning, I go for a walk. Then on my way to work, I stop along the beach and go for a longer walk. Whenever I have breaks between clients, I go for another walk. You’ll often see me outside enjoying nature. Life flows well for me and filters into the rest of my life when I’m in nature, when I’m outside. This can be walking in the neighborhood, along a park, or on the beach.
Unfortunately, I see many people don’t flow with life. Rather, they fight life. They could be working towards some goal, academic or professional, and because they’re working so hard towards it, they put aside their flow, their natural love and passions, in order to reach this goal. Others get caught up in some addiction—alcohol, drugs, or relationships—instead of doing things that are good for them. In both of these situations, we suffer because we’re not flowing with life. We’re not keeping our life simple and engaging in activities that fill us up.
Imagine for a moment that we’re a beautiful flower. As long as we get the proper sunshine, healthy soil, and the right amount of good clean water we thrive. But when we’re put in dark places or surrounded by contaminated dirt or deprived of nourishing water, we shrivel, suffer, and maybe die. A similar thing happens on a psychological level.
I remember once reading a study about children who were allowed to eat whatever they wanted from the choices given them, which did not include sugary foods. They naturally ate a balanced diet; the children knew intrinsically what their bodies needed. But they were not allowed to have any sugar because they would not have listened to their bodies and eaten a healthy meal.
As long as we take the time to figure out what our needs are, what fills us up and makes us happy (much as the flower is happy with sunshine, good soil, and clean water), then we will make sure we get them. We know what we need to remain balanced.
Happiness is really a very simple way to approach life. When instead we stock our life full of activities, television, things that distract us from our internal selves or with addictions like drugs, alcohol, work, constant busyness, then we don’t really know what we need. The first step towards flowing naturally with life is to simplify our lives. We have to slow down and ask, “What do I need?”
By having moments of stillness, we often see what we need, which may not be constant over our lifetime. We need to remain open to learning of new needs as they can change in time. For example, for many years, I worked three long days and then took four days off. Later in my life, I realized it was time for me to change that schedule and work five normal days. Now, as I continue to get older, I’ve learned that my life flows much better when my activities and work are completed earlier and don’t extend too late in the evenings. So now I’m in the process of slowing down my practice and not working as late. But I came to these discoveries by checking in every now and then to see how I was doing. If we don’t take time to assess how we’re doing in the flow of life, then we don’t know what we need and likely won’t get it.
What we really need to work towards is finding our flow right now when our lives aren’t too full of activities. What do we need to make our day, our moments, go well? The answer is going to be very simple. Happiness has a flow to it that relates to who we are. For example, if someone is very passionate about the arts but is working in the medical field, then the person needs to find ways to make his or her work more artistic or change to a different field. Doing something for the sake of money or for making other people proud of us does not translate into our being happy. We create suffering and unhappiness for ourselves. We’re not going to change this overnight. But by saying, “What naturally is good for me, fills me up, and puts a smile on my face?” starts us on the right path, working towards greater happiness.
For example, having an affair might feel good at the time, but all the pain and suffering it’s going to cause isn’t worth that moment of pleasure. It won’t make us smile in the end. Instead, coming home, spending time with the people we love, letting them know how much we love them, and making time for these relationships that are important to us will have a flow to it. It’s going to go well and make us happy.
Spending time in nature is a great way to get that flow in life because nature is simple, beautiful, and rejuvenating. It demands nothing of us but fills us up with positive feelings and a restful mood after we’re in it. It helps us feel better. When we go on vacation, if it’s a natural, relaxing vacation, we come back feeling refreshed, rejuvenated, and ready to continue our life of work and serving others.
Life goes best when we flow with it, even in the process of helping and caring for others. If we like something and it’s important to us, we should make time to take part in it. For example, if we enjoy building things with our hands, we should