I am writing this post now from the sunny Paraguay, nice to be back here! I feel, with the sunshine my mojo is back too. Here I am coming now with a life changing philosophy what I have just learnt about.
For many years now the thought was always in my mind -especially when I watched youtube travel bloggers-, is something wrong with me? Other people I follow look always happy, high energy and vibrant, while I often notice my emotions take over my general mood. Yesterday morning I was thinking about how my life would look if I would be always happy? Is it possible at all to be always happy? What others do what gives me the impression generally they are happy people?
As you may know, in the last 2 years I was living a settled life with my wife and I spent daily 2 hours in the morning just to get into an “average me” and not to a “grumpy me” state. Yoga, breathing, meditation, cold shower…the good effects of all these exercises lasted until lunch time when I got into a low emotional state again. The question was always there, what is wrong with me? What can I do better? I did not like to stay in that low mood so spent enormous effort on trying to stay balanced – with more or less result.
Just few hours after the “how can I be always happy” question formed in my mind, I read a very thought provoking few pages in the book called The Buddha and the Badass by Vishen Lakhiani which just answered to my question perfectly. This book and chapter showed me a new way of thinking what I will apply from now on.
Disclaimer: the below quotes are from the book “The Buddha and the Badass” by Vishen Lakhiani with the purpose of simply sharing a philosophy to reach more people and in return the author of hunthentic.com will gain no benefits, this is not an advertisement.
“No one can be positive all the time. It’s not healthy or useful. And the truth is, “always-on” positivity takes away from experiencing true fulfillment. All emotions are useful. Feeling them fully is healthy. Acceptance is critical.”
So is it perfectly ok if I do not feel myself happy? Can I be grumpy too for a few hours? The problem is with not how I feel but whether I accept that feeling or not.
“So instead of happiness, aim for positive optimism. During negative emotional states, a positively optimistic person will remain committed to the outcome. They will see a bright future ahead even when they experience a setback, rejection, or loss. They accept negative emotions like sadness in the moment and view it as what it is: a temporary state.”
I used to be this kind of guy and still I am sometimes! Who may feel down for some time due to an experience – what he considers negative , but long term, he feels this is temporary. “This will pass too” – our favourite saying with my wife. It often comforts me that I know a continuous abundance follow us in our life. Our other saying is that “For every other expenses we have our Mastercard”. Most issues can be fixed if you have money, isn’t it? Life proven us so far, in whatever hopeless situation we faced with, a solution came out of nowhere! Everything is temporary as Vishen states and he continues…
“Look, we all get sad. And sadness has its own gifts of learning and self-discovery. Let’s not avoid sadness. Positive optimism accepts sadness while knowing that it’s temporary and more blissful states will come.”
In the most recent few months I was sad, even felt broken, so many times…I started thinking about someone may have cursed me or the Universe try to teach me a lesson while (almost) everything I touch breaks. What if just the negative childhood experiences I carry with me, the daily problems, the responsibilities on my shoulders, the always challenging circumstances made me feel broken? I thought, I may have a midlife crisis. Then I just realised, this midlife crisis is nothing more than if you do not leave behind the bags you carry with you over the years, will soon catch and bury you.
My message to my readers (especially to men): let’s not avoid dealing with your feelings and accept sadness and stay hopeful, this is all temporary! Women generally got used to dealing with their emotions and they do not try to hold all in. Men is the opposite, we drink alcohol, smoke cigarette, or do more healthy exercises like cold shower to numb the pain and ignore emotions.
“I am bliss. I am joy. I know these are my true nature. But right now I feel a sadness. I’m not pushing it away or denying it. I see this sadness as a companion. An energy within my field. I don’t know how long it will be with me. Maybe a month. Maybe years. But I honor it’s there. And I understand why it’s there.”
I don’t fully agree with that we must give sadness months or years, as my experience is that the longer you carry the negative feelings with you, the longer it effects your general wellbeing and can lead to depression or more serious illnesses. Learnt from Tony Robbins that with changing your physiology you can shake down the sad feeling – when you feel it was enough to be in this state and ready to live your life again. Vishen and I encourages not to let sadness overwhelm you. I think, the longer you stay in this negative state the more it will make your life misery. I often generate a relatively small problem into a huge one until I feel totally hopeless. My body got used to this over the years. What I heard today in a motivational video that you must program your mind daily with 30 minutes motivating, uplifting and positive thoughts OR your mind will program you daily with negative thoughts that will make you feel hopeless and lost.
“Happiness is a state change. Positive optimism, on the other hand, is a stage evolution.”
We do not have to look always happy, positive we rather must train our mind to see a prosperous future in every situation while accepting we feel bad time to time. I love this philophosy!
“A positively optimistic person is less reactive to their emotions. They have trained themselves to be more aware. They are a witness to what they feel and they proactively choose how to react. Positive optimism is not the rejection of sadness, but the thought, even during sadness, that the future will be okay”
Vishen suggests, this way of thinking can be learned. This is also a skill what we must work on daily. Looks easier than showing a (fake)happy face always and certainly a more authentic behaviour.
I hope this post gave you some value, if it did, please comment below! Hunthentic.com is becoming 3 years old in March, 2024! I want to value your commenting effort and until the end of March, I draw a gift between my loyal readers and commenters! This gift is your chosen book from your Amazon wish list (up to maximum $30). Please comment any of my posts you like and you may will be the lucky winner! will announce the winner on the first of April.
Your blog post made me very happy! So good to read! I bought that book more than a year ago and postponed listening, when I realized, it is more about company culture and leadership, that is not currently relevant in my life. 1 month ago I started to walk more again, and listen more Audible, so I picked again this book. I am so happy, I finally gave it to a shot, it was very useful for me too! We had a perfect timing in this too 🙂 Thank you for your insightful writing!
Thank you Timea, your feedback is the most valuable to me and how cool I even motivated you to give this book an other chance! I read Vishen’s first book that really impressed me and while I had the same thought, this book is more for business leaders, many thoughts I could relate to and consume. Thank you for your time for giving me this beautiful comment, I am super grateful and happy