How To Find Happiness In 14 Words

Happy new year! At least I hope 2009 is a happy one. With this in mind, here's a quickie happiness tip - in a mere 14 words:

It is better to be a little wrong than very right and very alone.

What do I mean by those powerful 14 words?

1. If you're having repeated relationship problems -- consistently thinking "I'm okay, everybody else sucks" -- it's time to start wondering what you (yes, li'l you) might be contributing to those "deja vu people problems" around you.

2. Make sure you're valuing the right qualities in others and yourself. For example, stop over-valuing "unwavering perfection" "unwavering agreement" and "the ability to mindread one's every thought and need without openly communicating." Next up, reappreciate these more important qualities: "loving heart" "wanting clarity and communion via honest dialogue" "appropriately-sized ego which is open to new POV's" and "flexible, growth-oriented nature." Keep these qualities in mind next time you're in a conflict with someone.

3. Consider saying the following tongue-twisters more to people: "How do you see things?" "How might I have hurt you?" "How could I better empathize with what you're going through?" "You talk first -- because I really want to hear how you feel and understand you better." "I really want to grow as a person and am willing to hear how I might have contributed to your hurt and/or anger." "I'm sorry." "I apologize."

This year promise yourself that next time you're in conflict with someone you will ask yourself if you really do find it so joyously preferable to feel so very, very right all the time. Because if you do, you will repeatedly -- simultaneously -- wind up finding yourself very, very alone.

Comments

[TaylorRae]

While a nice, touchy-feely sentiment, it doesn't work in all occasions.

Rosa Parks was very right and very alone and had she decided not to be we might not have had the historic election we just witnessed.

When the stakes are high, it is often the people that are "very right and very alone" that we thank the most.

[StanCohen]

This sounds a bit like "go along to get along" (which would be just 5 words)

I suppose this advice could make a really obstinate person happier. But I think it would make those who go along too much already even more miserable.

Some people's insistence on being right might make them unhappy. In other cases, maybe they just need to surround themselves with stronger people who aren't afraid of strong opinions.

[JanetAlstonJackson]

It's important to know that happiness is not something we have to get. We are born being happy. However our wrong or negative thoughts cloud over this natural state. Most of us chase things and people to make us happy, not realizing that if we stand still, and release the things that have held us back, (anger, jealousy, lack, and fears), we can naturally tap into our eternal happiness which is waiting to surface.

[cayuse1]

Nicely put. It is the wisdom of all great saints and teachers. I would only add we must win the battle over our senses to your list of things holding us back

Easier said than done, but we have eternity. It is the most any of us can do for others, to fix ourselves

[OtayPanky]

We're not born happy. Most of us are born squalling, and we squall plenty more after that...way before we construct our first thoughts. Anyone who spends time around infants knows this is true.

Further - psychologists have observed that there are big differences in temperament in babies right from birth. Some are exceptionally easygoing...others exceptionally edgy...and still others somewhere in between.

Romanticizing infancy is of no more use than calling us back to the mythical Garden of Eden, when our supposed primal parents were supposedly innocent, not knowing the difference between good and evil. Ken Wilber discusses this at length in identifying what he calls "the per-trans fallacy".

[riverhouse]

Half the harm that is done in this world
Is due to people who want to feel important
They don't mean to do harm
But the harm does not interest them.
Or they do not see it, or they justify it
Because they are absorbed in the endless struggle
To think well of themselves.

T. S. Eliot