Here are 4 random insights of happiness that I am learning as I go. “Learning as I go” because I will be the first to admit that I have yet to master them (working on it!). “Random” because they are in no particular order, neither are they related to one particular shade of happiness. Life throws me many lessons all the time, and they are rarely structured and follow some kind of syllabus. It’s random. It’s a little bit of everything. This is what I am learning today.
♥ You have to commit to your life.
My lovely friend, life coach and intuitive, Sue, said to me “Malavika, you must commit to your life.”
This is me and Sue.
She’s a pretty awesome lady, who raised a pretty awesome point. I started wondering what it means to really be committed to your life, and what does it feel like when you’re not? Who do you become if you are not committed to your own life?
Being committed to your life means taking onboard a new project: project you! Are you putting first things first in your life? Are you taking the time to educate yourself, both about the world and also about yourself (you little mystery, you!)? Are you engaging in relationships that add value and nourishment to your life? Are you pursing hobbies just because you love doing it? Are you doing what is important to you? Are you finances where you would like them to be, and if they are not, are you in the process of doing something about it? Are you in a job that you love, and if you are not, are you considering why you don’t enjoy it or what your options are? Are you studying as hard as you would like? Are you seeing the results you want to see? Are you in a relationship that you actually like being in, or are you wasting your time in something wrong for you just because you are scared to leave? Are you doing things that frighten you a little bit? Are you stepping outside your comfort zone? Are you taking part in your community in a way that makes you happy? Are you taking time for yourself? Are you acting on all your creative urges? Are you taking the initiative? Are you okay with saying no to other people’s demands on your time and energy? Are you putting in a good effort into a relationship with someone that you love? Are you investing time, money and energy into making yourself looking and feeling great?
These are all things that someone who is committed to themselves would do.
These things are not things that would be at the expense of someone else (no one would be seriously disadvantaged if you took the time to do these things), but not doing these things would be at the expense of yourself.
You know, no one else can do these things for me. Only I can. If I don’t do them, these things don’t happen.
If you want to be happy, you have to commit to your happiness, and all aspects of it. There is more to us than the job we have or the roles we play in our day to day life. We have to take the time to nurture ourselves
♥ Don’t make your happiness contingent on how you think things should be.
One lesson I have learned this year is to not make my happiness contingent on how “I think things should be.” We always get exactly what we need. We get the situations, relationships and challenges we need to learn more about ourselves, and to help us grow.
Rather than thinking “Oh my god, this can’t be happening” (because guess what sister? it can and it is!) try to replace that thought with “Wow, I wouldn’t have expected this to happen but it is, and like every other thing that has happened in my life – it will serve it’s purpose as an opportunity for me to grow.”
Life rarely goes exactly to plan. But life is perfect because life is exactly what you need.
If you expect to only find happiness where you have decided to look when you were 6 years old, you will be disappointed a lot. If this is something you are okay with, go ahead.
I find that when I release these stubborn thoughts I have about “how I need to live my life” I will find myself suddenly living my life the way I need to, and not just theorizing and conceptualizing it.
I work very hard these days to remain open to all kinds of possibilities in every facet of my life. I try to keep my expectations high (but not limited to just one way of reaching it), my vibration up (in alignment with the best of the best), my feet grounded and my heart open.
If something is not going to “plan” in your life, take a moment to try to shift your persepective. What if this was the plan? Maybe it wasn’t your plan, but what if it is THE PLAN? What if this is exactly that is meant to happen? What if nothing was “wrong” or “broken” or “misguided” about your life right now? How could you approach situations, circumstance and relationships in a more open way, if you knew this was true?
When you are open to your life, beautiful things begin to happen.
♥ Your partner is not necessarily responsible for your feelings of intimacy or lack therof.
Relationships are cyclical by nature and we go through periods of Intimacy, conflict and withdrawal These are the three states of mind in any relationship. It is a natural process and no matter how happy you are together and what a hottie your boyfriend/girlfriend is, or how close you usually are with your best friend, you will eventually transition into phase 2: conflict.
In the intimacy stage, your honey has deposited enough love units into your love bank to trigger an intimate response. You feel close and cuddly. You want to do things for your partner. You do anything you can to make them happy and whatever you can to avoid their unhappiness. Because both people are more concerned about meeting your partners needs, both your needs are fulfilled. The trust begins to build, you feel safe to feel emotionally vulnerable, you share all parts of yourself, and wouldn’t even think of hurting eachother because at this time, hurting your partner would be the same as hurting yourself. We start to give unconditionally. When your partner has a need, we rush to fulfill it without expecting anything in return.
Bad habits can develop during this phase because we tend to “look past” them, but as we all know, when bad habits have been around for a while – it becomes very hard to change them. Over time, because we tend to fail to negotiate terms that benefit both partners during this stage, it tends to drive into the next stage which is conflict.
And after conflict, comes withdrawal. And after withdrawal comes intimacy.
Don’t take this personally.
Over time, we can learn to spend more time in intimacy and work through the other phases of conflict and withdrawal more naturally and with less resistance.
This cycle has nothing to do with you, or your partner. We just invent reasons to make us believe that we are justified. We are in “Conflict” now because we don’t agree about something (even if this something is very insignificant in the grand scheme of things). We are in “withdrawal” now because you hurt my feelings.
In reality, I think it’s very easy to be with somebody. You just be with that person. You just love them, whether you “Feel like it” or not. It’s just something you do.
No matter how you are feeling about this person, if you want a love to last, love them anyway. This goes for all intimate relationships. If you are disappointed in your boyfriend, be a loving girlfriend anyway. If you are angry at your father, be a loving daughter anyway.
No body, including yourself, needs to be punished for the existence of these three phases. No one has to be at blame, and you can cut yourself some slack in realizing that you don’t even have to go around searching for reasons to validate your conflict or withdrawal. If a real and lasting love is what you want to create, then these phases become background noise. All you need to focus on is the love, and continue to act in love.
Because love is not intimacy. And love is not conflict. And love is not withdrawal.
Love is just love. And love is not a feeling. When we start to believe that love is a feeling, we will be terrified at the thought of it coming and going away, because that’s what feelings do.
So to summarize, if you want to create a love that lasts, you have to be the love that lasts, whether or not you feel like it or not. Recognize the natural harmony and cycles of your relationship, and don’t take it personally.
♥ You only have to deal with challenges that are happening right now.
Konstantin said (Wow, I’m quoting him on nearly every post I write now…geez!) that it is unnecessary to put all your energy into worrying about what problems “could” come up in the future. Instead of thinking of all the different scenarios, versions and possibilities and emotionally preparing and executing mental attacks on these fantasies– is kind of a waste of energy. He said “Right now, I can solve any problem that I can face. But do I need to prepare for all of them?”
(Then he added “Especially since my biggest problem is coming back in 2 months.” – since I’m returning back to Ireland in August. Aww what a cute jerk!)
I think he brings up a very valid point. Synonymous to “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it”, I think that a great way reduce in-the-moment-stress is to only deal with problems that may be happening now.
As you efficiently deal with what you can deal with right now, you will allow your days to pass and your life to move forward on the path you have chosen with your guided intentions and decisions you make today. As you move forward, you will encounter new things that you will need to work through – and it’s very hard to predict what these things may be. We cannot know what tomorrow will bring for us, but the best way to be prepared for tomorrow is to by making the most of today. If you are not making the most of your todays, you will not be prepared for your tomorrows.
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