Happiness Is Never Here | Note 538

Are you happy, or are you pursuing happiness?

 
Yesterday’s emotional episode of the Sincerely HER Podcast got me thinking about happiness. And today, I want to share a quote from the book The Gap and The Gain: The High Achievers’ Guide to Happiness, Confidence, and Success by Dr. Benjamin Hardy and Dan Sullivan. In the book they share some insight about the pursuit of happiness.
 
In the introduction, appropriately titled, Why Most People Aren’t Happy, Dr. Benjamin Hardy and Dan Sullivan write, “By saying happiness is something we’re pursuing, the direct implication is that we don’t have it now. You don’t pursue something you already have. Even if we’ve already achieved something great, this pursuing keeps happiness always up ahead and around the corner. Happiness is after the next achievement. Happiness is somewhere in the distant future. Happiness is out there. But happiness is never here.”
 
They go on to say, “The consequences of this framing aren’t small. By embracing the pursuit of happiness, we rob ourselves of happiness in the here and now. We fail to appreciate who we are and what we’ve done to this point. When your happiness is tied to something in the future, then your present is diminished. You don’t feel happy, confident, or successful. But maybe in the future you will be, or so the logic goes.”
 
So what’s it going to be? Will you believe you’re happy now or subscribe to the idea that happiness is never here?

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