You don't have to be happy all the time to have inner happiness
Understanding this can totally transform your life.
Okay, this is not officially science-backed. It’s ‘Wendy’ logic.
I’ve been a mindset coach for many years and learned a great deal about people along the way, including learning about myself.
The most common reply when I ask “How do you want to feel?” is HAPPY.
So, let’s talk about that today.
For most of us, I just don’t think it’s realistic to expect to be happy all the time.
I believe that all emotions are normal and I wouldn’t expect to feel happy every minute of the day.
My entire business is online. I basically work from my laptop. Wrongly, many people assume that I’m super tech-savvy.
I’m soooo not that person.
When my laptop or whatever I’m working on doesn’t do what I want it to, I tend to get very frustrated and tears have been known.
At that moment, I’m a lot of things but I’m not happy.
And that’s okay.
I don’t need to be happy 24/7.
You don’t need to be happy 24/7
Let me say this differently. I don’t need to be what I call surface-level happy all the time.
Instead, I want to be happy at my core level.
At my core, I’m a happy person.
On the surface, I can be happy, sad, angry, down in the dumps, frustrated…
A person who is sad or miserable at their core can have bursts of happiness.
My goal here today is NOT to make you happy in this moment, my goal is to give you some tools and techniques today to help you build your core level of happiness.
As always I want to give easy-to-apply tips that you can start right now.
Do them all or start with just one and build up.
1. Start paying attention
Most people are really good at focusing on what they don’t like. Instead, I want you to make a shift to DELIBERATELY pay attention to anything that adds happiness to your day-to-day life.
Notice it
Acknowledge it
Anchor it with gratitude
How to anchor happiness with gratitude
When you anchor a boat, you keep it where it is or at least in the general area.
Whenever you notice that you’re feeling happy, anchor the feeling.
In your mind or even out loud say “Yes, I like this. I feel so happy. This is what I want and this is how I want to feel.”
Pay attention to the FEELING.
“I love this feeling”
Where do you feel it in your body?
Some people like to give the feeling a colour to focus on. For example, If I close my eyes and think of feeling happy, I picture a warm glowy yellow circle with hints of warm pink swirls.
I’m not going to tell you what colour you should visualize and if that’s not your thing, skip it. There are no hard rules.
Once you’ve anchored the feeling of happiness, express gratitude.
I’m so grateful for this feeling.
I love feeling like this.
Keep your focus on the feeling
2. Deliberately look out for or create things to feel happy about
Every day you can CHOOSE to add happiness to your day.
I think that by default we’re programmed to pick up the bad stuff in the world or focus on things we don’t like.
Think about the news channels. A good 90% is generally about how awful things are and there might be a quick feel-good story at the end.
You need to make a DELIBERATE shift to find the good stuff in life.
You need to actively create your happy moments.
Let’s say that you’re walking from one place to the other. Look about you and look for things you can feel happy about.
At each stage of your day, look out for things to feel happy about and actively create pockets of happiness throughout the day.
Pockets of happiness that I like to create in my day.
Taking time to pet my cat and dog before I start the day. Indie, my Shih Tzu sleeps on my bed, so he gets a little fuss and my cat, Buddy has usually appeared at the side of my bed to tell me it’s feeding time. He gets a little rub on the head which he appreciates. I love my animals so much and this little act that takes around 10 seconds boosts my happiness tank to full first thing in the morning.
I talk to my pets when I’m home. Yes, my pets are a big contributing factor to my daily happiness. Buddy responds with various acceptable noises. Indie generally has a look that says “You’re so weird but I love you anyway.”
A morning mug of tea. I make sure I pay attention and actually enjoy it.
Putting perfume on. A simple pleasure but one that, for me, adds to my happiness.
Looking at birds, wildlife and nature. I’m super lucky that I live in a very rural village and seeing some sort of wildlife is a regular thing. Looking at the trees and flowers… It might be a few seconds to glance out of the window as I’m working but when it’s acknowledged as something that makes you feel happy that builds your core level happiness tank.
3. Don’t depend on other people for your happiness
There is no question about it. I have wonderful people in my life who add to my happiness and I love them all.
My point here is that I don’t want your happiness to depend on someone else.
Other people add to your happiness.
Let me give you an example.
Jane lives alone and when her son comes to visit she feels happy. If her son doesn’t visit, Jane is not happy. Jane is depending on her son to make her happy in this scenario.
Let’s switch that story around.
Jane lives on her own. She loves to create pockets of happiness throughout her day. When her son visits she loves seeing him and she always feels happy to spend time with him. If he doesn’t visit, Jane still adds different pockets of happiness to her day.
Jane is creating her own happiness in this scenario and is not dependent on her son to provide the happy feeling.
Tools and Techniques for Happiness
I’ve written quite a lot about happiness over the years, so I’d like to direct you to some of those reads.
Try out the tips I share in them.
Fill your mind with happiness messages throughout the day.
EFT Tapping scripts for happiness
EFT - Emotional Freedom Techniques is perfect for releasing low emotions and raising your vibrations to feel happy.
There are more tips to boost your happiness.
The more you can add happiness into your day-to-day life, the stronger your core happiness level will become.
Most of the time, I’m in a neutral to happy state. I’ve got that core happiness but I’m not radiating happiness 24/7.
I have lots of happiness pockets throughout the day because I’ve deliberately added them and you can do this too.
And then I have times when on the surface I’m experiencing a whole range of emotions.
The goal is not to be happy all the time.
The goal is to build your core happiness.
I get frustrated sometimes but I’m not frustrated at a core level.
I’m sad sometimes but I’m not sad at a core level.
There have been times in my life when I have felt sad at my core level for a time especially when my dad died.
I experienced a sadness that I’d never experienced before and for a while, I felt like it would break me. It didn’t.
Gradually, I started to top up my happiness levels again and the sadness eased.
I still feel sad that he’s not around and there are times when I cry because I wish he was here but now I can allow that feeling and still hold on to my core happiness.
I hope that’s all made sense.
What are your thoughts? Click the comment button and let me know.
New on The Blog
1-Hour EFT Tapping and Journalling Exercise: Improve The Way You Feel.
Note: You don’t have to know how to do EFT or journalling. Everything you need is included in the blog post.
You also don’t have to spend this long doing EFT or Journalling. This exercise is for when you have the extra time. Enjoy.
This week’s on Medium
A message about upgrading to my paid Newsletter
Before I go I want to share a thought about my newsletter for paying subscribers. If you’re already signed up, thank you so much. If you’re not, that’s absolutely fine too.
The focus is very much on goals and empowerment, but, what I want to say is this.
A goal is simply something you want. If happiness is something you want more of this is a goal.
In my paid newsletters I never focus on specific goals, We’re all unique and we all have our own unique goals. They are all important.
My goal with the paid newsletters which go out every Sunday is to help you achieve your goals whatever they are.
Read a preview of this week’s paid newsletter. And you can use the free 7-day trial to read the full post and take a look around the Empowered Accountability Zone.
That’s it from me for another week. Thanks for being here with me.
If you’ve enjoyed today’s newsletter and found it helpful, please pass it along and share. Thank you so much.
Wendy xx