What if happiness isn't about feeling good?

Since the very beginning of life, most of us are taught that the key to a good life is to feel good as often as we possibly can. We're praised for being happy little kids and usually reprimanded or told we need to be different if we appear to be angry little kids or kids who cry too much sometimes. And it’s this that sets the stage for the very thing that blocks our happiness as we get older.

Let me explain.

What happens when we think that happiness is about feeling good?

When we think that happiness is all about feeling good, we pressure ourselves to feel good and when we inevitably don't feel good, we start to feel bad. We look around and see other people feeling good, and this discrepancy between how we should feel (based on how happy we’re told we should be and how happy we think other people are around us) and how we actually feel makes us less happy.

So, the idea that happiness is a function of only feeling good is problematic because it actually creates added discontent. In essence, you might not be feeling that great and you end up feeling even worse because of the added pressure you put on yourself— and that others put on you— to feel good.

But that’s not all…

When we think that the key to a good life is only feeling good, it prevents us from doing the very things that we need to do in order to feel good. Which is to feel. Period. Feel whatever it is that our life is beckoning us to feel in any given moment. My friend and colleague, Andrew Daniel, just had a deep chat about this in The Happiness Hub. Come hear the full conversation!

What happens when we think that happiness is about feeling?

When we think that happiness is about feeling everything that shows up in our awareness, we start to welcome all of our feelings no matter whether they're positive, negative, or somewhere in between. And when we welcome rather than reject those feelings because we're no longer afraid that they’re not how we should be or should feel, they actually pass through us all on their own. We become able to process thoughts, feelings, and events right as they happen, and we don’t exacerbate the times we don’t feel great by pressuring ourselves to feel differently than we do. We're left naturally feeling content, without needing to exert any effort at all and without needlessly 'shoulding on' and pressuring ourselves to feel good. Because as it turns out, true happiness isn’t about feeling good, it’s about feeling. Period.

Because as it turns out, true happiness isn’t about feeling good, it’s about feeling. Period.

It can feel counterintuitive at first, I know. “If I want to feel good, why would I just let myself feel bad?” And it's because most everything you were taught about feeling good (at home, at school, and by the media) has been wrong or incomplete in some way. And it’s because we all need a bit of re-education in how to truly be happy in our lives that I created my deep dive program, Happy from the Inside Out. Start with what I described here— just letting yourself feel everything— and let me know how it goes!