Lifestyle

by: Jared Akers

“I have found the paradox, that if you love until it hurts,
there can be no more hurt, only more love.”
–Mother Teresa

It’s hard to imagine a worse feeling.  Sitting alone in my new apartment knowing my girlfriend of four years would rather be alone than to have me in her life.  I love her, and the reality of not having her in my life hurts like nothing I’ve ever experienced.

After crying for several months and missing a lot of work, I do something drastic.  I sell my prized guitar and buy an engagement ring.  A hopeless romantic, I pick up 63 long-stem roses, one for each day we’ve been apart.

It’s winter, there’s a foot of snow on the ground and I’m standing outside her door.  I smell the wood burning in the fireplace, wood I probably split myself.  I also painted this house, and I notice how good it looks this evening.

Scared as hell, I knock.

She answers and… after that, I’m not real sure what happened next.  I’d like to say I hit my knees and the shock and awe of my romanticism made everything perfect in an instant.  In reality, she was shocked at my audacity of showing up on her doorstep with a ring after she told me to get lost.

I couldn’t believe she didn’t take me back in a flurry of love and appreciation.  Even after sharing how I sold my most prized possession to buy her a pretty diamond.  She knew how much that guitar meant to me.

So there I was, on my knees crying in the snow by the curb.

Man, love hurts.

Lack of Self Love

Today I realize that this old relationship was bad news.  It was toxic and extremely unhealthy for all parties involved.  The person I am today would never be in a relationship like that.

Quite to the contrary, today I’m married to the most amazing woman in the world.  And it happened because I learned to love myself first.

Some believe it’s impossible to love others until we learn to love ourselves.  I disagree.  I loved a lot before loving myself; and yes it really hurt.

A good illustration is that I would give you the shirt off my back in an instant, but would subconsciously think, “Don’t you dare try and give me yours.”

With the key ingredient of ‘self’ missing from self-love or emotional connectedness, I was seeking acceptance rather than love.  I loved you so you would love me; or at least I hoped you would.  But it doesn’t work that way, at least not very well for very long.

“Men do not attract that which they want, but that which they are.”
–James Allen (from As A Man Thinketh)

I was emotionally unavailable, so I attracted the same.  Not until I learned to truly accept the consequences of being myself, could I move from seeking acceptance to finding true love; love for self and all that comes with it.

On March 12 of 2006 I had an awakening.  Or more precisely I hit a bottom; a point of desperation of which my failed relationship was just one of many catalysts.  I faced a crossroads.  To put it bluntly, life or death were the only choices I saw at the time.

I chose life, and everything changed.

As I write this, the Mega Millions multi-state lottery in the US has a record jackpot estimated at 540 million (and yes I bought a ticket).  How you would live your life if money was of no concern?  That when something came up you wanted to experience, the first thought was, “Do I want to do that?” not “Can I afford it?”

That’s the power of making the decision to live, and taking action, gave me.  Life today is like walking into a job you love, but don’t really need because you won the lottery.  You take more chances, get out of your comfort zone and as a result experience amazing returns.

I realized what others thought about me didn’t matter because I was finally alive.  Everything beyond that was just gravy.  I sought help through therapy, 12 step programs, clergy, books, seminars, ad infinitum.

I was on a quest to find purpose, happiness, and my authentic self.  And what I found at the root of it all was love.

A study known as The Grant Study followed two hundred and sixty-eight men for over seventy-two years.  In the article titled, What Makes Us Happy, in the Atlantic Magazine, the director of the study ascertains the key to happiness is love:

“The job isn’t conforming; it isn’t keeping up with the Joneses.  It is playing, and working, and loving.  Loving is probably the most important.  Happiness is love, full stop.”

Nothing Left but Love

To love oneself – to be truly emotionally connected to self – allows us to give love away with nothing expected in return.  There’s tremendous power in this for we cannot give away something we do not have.

With love flowing outwards, instead of always seeking it externally through acceptance, we require less (if anything) from others.  There is no “balance” to be maintained.  No love deposits and withdraws to track in our self-esteem ledger.

When I feel anger, regret, guilt, worry, or any perceived negative emotion, I feel uneasiness in my spirit and sometimes it even physically hurts.

When my father passed away suddenly in 2010, it was then I realized how much I had changed.  Love as the dominant emotion in my life enables me to see beauty even in seemingly tragic situations.

The day before my father’s funeral, we were looking through photos of my dad to show at the service.  My five year old niece said, “It’s sad that grandpa had to die, but at least we have all these great pictures of him.”  I thought that was beautiful.

With love for self, the underlying knowing that who I am is enough, and acceptance of all things is easier.  Yet it’s important to note that I can accept something without having to directly like it.

My daily mantra is to only give and receive love.

When I tell people I love everyone, some call me crazy or say that’s impossible.  But honestly, it hurts not to.

Here are 7 ways to live happier through love:

1. Learn how to sit quietly in a room alone. – The inability to sit quietly in a room alone suggests you’re not comfortable with yourself.  Learn how to accept and love who you are.  Read The Power of Now.
2. Expect less. – Expectation is the root cause of most heartache.  Managing expectations can be difficult, but it’s a valuable ingredient in learning to love unconditionally.  Expecting less does not mean lowering your standards, goals or values, it simply means you must learn to be realistic and realize the difference between what you can and cannot control.
3. Care less. – What?  This is crazy you might say.  In Martha Beck’s article in O Magazine, How to Love More by Caring Less, she explains how caring suggests conditions that have different meanings than love.  Caring suggests you’re attached to the outcome emotionally where love is pure acceptance.
4. Take care of yourself first. – A great analogy for this is the airline oxygen mask procedure – how the flight attendant instructs parents to put the oxygen mask on themselves first, before their children.  If you do not love yourself, you’re not much good to anyone else.
5. Know what self love is. – While discussing the topic of love in a support group, someone shared, “I settled for sex when what I really wanted was love.” Learn to love and respect yourself so you’ll know the difference.  Read The Mastery of Love.
6. Learn the love language of others – Being an emotional person, I longed for a deep relationship with my father.  Talking about emotions or topics on self-enlightenment was something my father was not good at.  But he was good at other things.  Through the process of self-awareness, I learned that my father expressed love in different ways.  This enabled me to enjoy a completely differently relationship with him even though he hadn’t really changed.
7. Learn how to show love – We’re judged by our actions rather than our intentions.  Make it a point to verbally express love as well as display it physically.  This is a benefit of learning someone’s love language; make it a point to show them how much you love them in many different ways.  Read Love and Respect.

And remember, if you hurt from love now, be grateful that you still have the capacity to love, make some necessary adjustments and keep on loving.  Your big heart will get you to happier places in the long-term.

About the author:  Jared Akers is a writer and tester of the impossible.  He writes, inspires, and enjoys helping people learn how to be happy.  He’s been developing a life of happiness with his wife for the better part of the last decade while sharing his journey at JaredAkers.com.

Photo by: Mari Moon

The unhappiest people in this world are the people who
care the most about what everyone else thinks.

“What’s wrong with wanting to please others?”

That’s what several people asked me via email in response to one of my recent articles.  Today, I want to discuss why it’s not healthy to try to please everyone, and how to stop yourself from doing so.

Seeking approval from others is perfectly fine up until the point where you are compromising your health and happiness in the process.  It becomes a serious problem if you feel as though widespread positive approval from others is the very oxygen you need to breathe.  There was a time in my life when I felt exactly this way.

I literally felt like I was short of breath – almost as if I’d die if my peers didn’t approve of me.  This is a condition that developed in my mind when I was very young, after kids in grade school teased me for being a “nerd.”  I did everything I could to win their approval.  And although I grew out of my awkward stage pretty early in my teenage years, the damage was done – I was left feeling insecure.  I was conditioned to seek and beg for outside approval at all times.

The big problem was that, as a twenty-something college graduate entering the work force, I felt that anything I did or even thought only had validity if it was the “right thing” to say and think.  And by “right thing,” what I really mean is “what other people thought was right.”  I was terrified to step outside the box of acceptability – which was especially harmful to my creativity as I tried to nurture my passion for writing and blogging.

Once I realized what I was doing, I read several books, spoke with a coach, and focused diligently on healing this broken part of myself.

The bottom line is that constant approval-seeking forces you to miss out on the beauty of simply being yourself, with your own unique ideas and desires.  If you are led through life only doing and being what you’ve come to believe is expected of you, then, in a way, you cease to live.

So how can you stop fearing what everyone thinks of you?  Let’s take a look:

1.  Get comfortable with not knowing what other people think.

When I first started writing on this blog, I’d agonize over whether people would think what I was writing was good enough.  I desperately hoped they’d like it, and oftentimes I’d catch myself imagining they didn’t.  Then one day I realized how much energy I was wasting worrying about it.  So I’ve gradually learned to relax with simply not knowing.

Some problems in life, such as not knowing what others think of you, are not really meant to be resolved.  How people perceive you may have more to do with them than you anyway.  They may even like or dislike you simply because you’ve triggered an association in their minds by reminding them of someone they liked or disliked from their past, which has absolutely nothing to do with you.

So here’s a new mantra for you – say it, and then say it again: “This is my life, my choices, my mistakes and my lessons.  As long as I’m not hurting people, I need not worry what they think of me.”  (Angel and I discuss this in more detail in the “Self-Love” and “Relationships” chapters of “1,000 Little Things Happy, Successful People Do Differently.”)

2.  Know that most people are NOT thinking about you anyway.

Ethel Barrett once said, “We would worry less about what others think of us if we realized how seldom they do.”  Nothing could be closer to the truth.

Forget what everyone else thinks of you; chances are, they aren’t thinking about you anyway.  If you feel like they always are, understand that this perception of them watching you and critiquing your every move is a complete figment of your imagination.  It’s your own inner fears and insecurities that are creating this illusion.  It’s you judging yourself that’s the problem.

3.  Accept that someone else’s opinion is NOT your problem.

How many times have you looked at a person and initially misjudged their brilliance?  Appearances are deceptive.  How you seem to someone and how you actually are rarely congruent.  Even if they get the basic gist of who you are, they’re still missing a big piece of the puzzle.  What someone thinks of you will rarely contain the whole truth, which is fine.

If someone forms an opinion of you based on superficialities, then it’s up to them, not you, to reform those opinions based on a more objective and rational viewpoint.  Leave it to them to worry about – that is, if they even have an opinion at all.

Bottom line:  The opinions other people have about you is their problem, not yours.  The less you worry about what they think of you, the less complicated your life becomes.  (Read The Four Agreements.)

4.  Ask yourself, “Does what they think even matter?”

People will think what they want to think.  No matter how carefully you choose your words and mannerisms, there’s always a good chance they’ll be misinterpreted and twisted upside down by someone.  Does this really matter in the grand scheme of things?  No, it doesn’t.

How others see you is not important.  How you see yourself means the world.  When you’re making big decisions, remember, what you think of yourself and your life is more important than what people think of you.  Stay true to YOU.  Never be ashamed of doing what feels right.  Decide what you think is right and stick to it.

5.  See the benefit in being unique.

If you’re thinking like everyone else, you aren’t thinking.  And if you aren’t thinking, you aren’t truly living.

It’s human nature to attempt to mimic other humans we look up to – perhaps a parental figure or a celebrity – especially when we are feeling insecure in our own skin.  But attempting to be someone else will always leave us feeling empty inside.  Why?  Because what we appreciate about the people we admire is their individuality – the qualities that make them unique.  To really copy them, we need to develop our own individuality, and in that way, we would actually be less like them and more like our true selves.

We all have quirks and unique perspectives.  The more relaxed you become with your own differences, the more comfortable you will start to feel just being YOU.  Celebrate being different, off the beaten path, a little on the weird side… your own special creation.  If you find yourself feeling like a fish out of water, by all means find a new river to swim in.  But DO NOT change who you are; BE who you are.  (Read The Road Less Traveled.)

6.  Be fully present and aware of how you DO want to feel.

It’s OK to know how you do not want to feel, but that’s not all you should be thinking about.  Imagine someone trying to learn to read by spending all their time focusing on how they do not want to not be able to read.  It doesn’t really make any sense, does it?

Enough is enough!  Forget what you do not want to feel for a moment.  Work out how you DO want to feel right now in the present moment.  Train yourself to live right here, right now without regretting how others once made you feel, or fearing the possibility of future judgment.

If you were delivering life-saving mouth-to-mouth resuscitation on your mom in public, you’d be 100% focused and present.  You wouldn’t be thinking about what bystanders thought of your hair, your body type, or the brand of jeans you were wearing.  All these inconsequential details would vanish from your consciousness.  The intensity of the situation would motivate you to choose not to care about what others might be thinking of you.  This proves, quite simply, that thinking about what others are thinking about you is YOUR CHOICE.

7.  Speak and live your truth.

Speak your truth even if your voice shakes.  Be cordial and reasonable, of course, but don’t tread carefully on every word you say.  Push your concerns of what others might think aside.  Let the consequences of doing so unravel naturally.  What you’ll find is that most of the time no one will be offended or irritated at all.  And if they do get upset, it’s likely only because you’ve started behaving in a way that makes them feel they have less power over you.

Think about it.  Why be fake?

In the end, the truth usually comes out one way or the other, and when that happens, you’re standing alone if you’ve been living a lie.  So live your whole truth starting now.  If someone gives you a hard time and says, “You’ve changed,” it’s not a bad thing.  It just means you stopped living your life their way.  Don’t apologize for it.  Instead, be open and sincere, explain how you feel, and keep doing what you know in your heart is right.

Afterthoughts

A life spent ceaselessly trying to please people who, perhaps, are incapable of ever being pleased, or trying too hard to always be seen as doing “the right thing,” is a sure road to a regretful existence.

Do more than just exist.  We all exist.  The question is:  Do you live?

I eventually realized existing without ever truly living was not what I wanted for myself.  So I made changes – I implemented all seven of the points discussed in this article and never looked back.  If you are in the same place I once was, seeking approval from everyone for every little thing you do, please take this post to heart and start making changes today.  Life is too short not to.

Your turn…

How has the fear of what other people think interfered with your life?  What has it stopped you from doing?  How have you coped?  Leave a comment below and share your insights with us.

Photo by: Zev

This post has moved to HERE:

Teamwork: How Small People Create Massive, Life-Changing Results

Everyone experiences unhappy times on occasion, but there is a big difference between experiencing a temporary bout of sadness and living a habitually unhappy life.  That’s what chronically unhappy people do.

Even if you are generally a happy person, take a look at these seven habits to determine if any of them are keeping you from experiencing greater amounts of joy.

1.  Playing it too safe.

Don’t play it so safe that you put yourself in situations where none of your potential options satisfy your calling.  Dream your dream, but also realize that you are more than just the dreamer, you are the point of origin for your dream’s reality.

Your dream is your creative vision for your future life.  You must break out of your current comfort zone and become comfortable with the unfamiliar.  Start smashing through those emotional barriers.  Move forward.  Life doesn’t magically give you what you want in your mind; it gives you what you insist upon with your actions.  Read The Power of Habit.

2.  Continuous self doubt.

You will inevitably become who you believe yourself to be.

If you spend enough time saying, “I’m not smart enough, thin enough and rich enough,” it’s likely that you will someday be right.  On the contrary, if you have the belief that you are smart enough, thin enough and rich enough now to take the next positive step forward, over time you will likely acquire the capacity to be these very things at your desired level of expectation.

3.  Obsession with control.

Sometimes people put too much interest into trying to control every tiny aspect of their lives.  Learn to let go, relax and ride the path that life takes you.  Try something new, take a chance, but above all, smile and enjoy the scenery.

Freeing yourself from trying to control the insignificant things lets you experience more of the good stuff around you.  The greatest joys in life are often the unexpected surprises that arrive when you are flexible and open to life’s twists and turns.  Read Buddha’s Brain.

4.  Setting unrealistic expectations.

You won’t drop two jean sizes overnight.  Your relationships won’t grow without your attention.  You can’t pay off $25K in debt in a week.  Your new business venture won’t instantly turn a profit.

You’re going to make mistakes every now and then.  You will go a day or two when you feel like you’re running in place.  You’re going to try new techniques and they’re not always going to work.  You’re a human being.  You’re going to fail from time to time.  But that’s how you grow.  Worthwhile goals take work and persistence.

5.  A bad attitude.

The greatest discovery you will ever make is that you can change your life by simply changing your attitude.  Optimism is the most essential human trait, because it allows you to evolve your ideas and improve every situation you encounter.

So don’t take things for granted.  Be positive and realize how fortunate you are.  Not every day will be perfect, but if you pay attention you’ll realize that 99.9% of the time you’re having either a good day or a great day.

6.  Slacking on exercise.

You DO have enough time to exercise.  If you say otherwise, you’re lying to yourself.  The truth is you don’t have time not to, or sooner or later you’ll be making time for illness.

At least 30 minutes of exercise every day has been proven on countless occasions by countless medical studies to increase the strength, happiness and longevity of human lives.  You’re talking about three and a half hours a week.  That’s hardly seems an excessive amount of time considering the tremendous benefits in terms of the impact on the remaining 164.5 hours of the week.  Read The 4-Hour Body.

7.  Overindulgence of a good thing.

As Oscar Wilde once said, “Everything in moderation, including moderation.”

Eating too much makes you fat.  Spending too much money makes you broke.  Working too much leaves your family at home missing you.  Playing too much leaves important work undone…  And so on and so forth.

Happiness depends on the balancing act of applying your positive resources equally to the hungry deficits in your life.  All details aside, the important thing to remember is this:  Long-term happiness is never found in one good thing; it is a combination, it is a balanced lifestyle.

Photo by: Chelsea Chen

If you listen closely to your intuition you will always know what is “best” for you, because what is best for you is what is true for you.

Your body has five senses: sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch.  But not to be ignored are the inner senses of your soul: intuition, foresight, and self-trust.  The most common differences between happy and unhappy people lie in their use of these inner senses.  So many people don’t know anything about them though, while others rely on their inner senses just as they rely on their physical senses, and in fact probably even more.  And this makes all the difference in the world.

The senses of your soul help you express your whole truth, and being true to yourself takes work, because it’s so easy to get sidetracked and influenced by others.  It’s easy to get caught up in the drama.  You have to put in the effort and stand strong every day to honor your own ideas, feelings, intuitions and aspirations.

When you add more of your self into your daily actions and decisions, your sense of self-worth (your TRUE self) blooms.  That is the path to a happier, truer, more wholesome YOU.

So today, I challenge you to make this your lifelong motto: “I respectfully do not care.”  Say it to anyone who passes judgment on something you strongly believe in or something that makes you who you are.  People will inevitable judge you at some point anyway, and that’s OK.  You affected their life; don’t let them affect yours.

This is one of many principles Angel and I cover in our brand new course, Getting Back to Happy.  And today, I want to share a sneak peek with you that’s guaranteed to help you overcome the judgments and drama of others, so you can live more freely and happily as YOU.

In this unscripted video sneak peek, Angel and I discuss how important it is to embrace your intuition and express your true feelings, even in the face of adversity and harsh judgments by others.  And of course, at the end we leave you with one essential question to ask yourself…

The One Question

If you enjoyed this exclusive preview of Getting Back to Happy, learn more about the course here.

And get ready to receive your personal invitation to join the new course and community on November 4th.  Angel and I cannot wait to welcome you into Getting Back to Happy!

True happiness is possible.  You can get there.  We can help.  Let’s do this, together.

Your turn…

In what way have people tried to judge you and mess with your truth?

When and how did you realize this?  What did you do about it?

Please leave a comment below and share your thoughts and insights.

And of course, if you have any questions about Getting Back to Happy, let us know and Angel and I will reply as soon as we can.