3 Things to Eliminate to Find Your Happiness
Jamaica, to say there are no words to describe you wouldn't be fair. To say that the five days I spent with you were unfathomable would not justify the bliss you brought to my life. The week I spent in Jamaica about a year ago, gave me a sense of peace, an easy, wonderful feeling that moved through my mind and within my heart. Removing myself from people, environments, and circumstances that support unhealthy habits, transformed my happiness into something I didn't know existed.
I've learned happiness is a decision, and once you make that decision there is a process to find that happiness. A process that begins with elimination.
Eliminate all thoughts that do not fuel you for the better.
There have been times I get a kick out of fueling my anger. I can be so abrasive, cold, and downright belligerent when my feelings are hurt. It comes in a flash, and I am no longer that sweet, silly jellybean. I'm more like that black bitter jellybean that you thought was grape but now you are sadly mistaken. Giving into those hurtful thoughts and expressing it in a way that is harmful to myself and those around me does only one thing, decrease my happiness.
It is best to take a step back and figure out what you're so damn angry about.
Men do this best if you ask me. Because they struggle dealing with their emotions, when emotions do flare up, men step aside and find a way to get back to ground zero. They get into a place where they can be logical again. Females on the other hand are used to emotions and don't care when it comes up or how it gets out. Whatever emotion we feel, those around us will feel it too. (We should wear a caution sign)
Eliminate contact with people who don't bring out the best parts of you
As a teenager I used to get soooo upset at my father. Whenever we spoke, it had to end with heads getting chopped off and spleens ripped out. Let the best fighter win. It was always him. I used to say 'I'm not like this around anyone else! Only around you!' Now, I'm positive my raging hormones had everything to do with my poor communication skills with my father back then. Plus, what teenager doesn't hate their parents. Like any parent-teenager relationship, there are people in your life who simply don't bring out the best in you. Instead, they bring out the worst.
Don't constantly use energy to fight this person day in and day out. Let them go, so you can make room for people who give you energy instead of drain it.
Eliminate situations that frustrate you or turn them around
Before I went to Jamaica, I was overly stressed due to work. There wasn't a day that something didn't piss me off. (I'm in the process of writing a book called Korporate Will Kill You) After I came back from Jamaica, my job didn't affect me quite the same. I made a decision to pursue life coaching and get certified. My stressful job was now funding my dream job.
Sometimes you can't eliminate the situation you’re in. Although, you can always turn your trials into triumphs, but you must be open to doing so.
After elimination is complete, the process on finding happiness can begin.
The things you go looking for, you are bound to find.
Once you declare your happiness and eliminate your unhappiness, you must look and produce your happy-go-lucky-ness until it is easy to recognize.
Let go of the ideas about what should make you happy. Let go of the idea that more money, more acknowledgement, more friends, more IG fame, more opportunities to sleep, a promotion, or brand new new car will bring about happiness, because it won't.
Yes it will feel good momentarily to acquire these things, but you will be surprised by how quickly that pleasurable high will fade.
With the amount of suicides that have happened by the hands of those with money, fame, and influence, it's apparent that happiness is derived from something on a deeper level.
We have been taught that happiness will come from all the crap we can stuff into our lives: clothes, cars, climbing the corporate ladder, clinging onto things that we will eventually lose.
Truth be told, happiness comes from the experiences we have, from those we love, the ability to grow, learn and change.
It's all about perspective no matter where you are. You must choose to see beauty in the situation you are in.
In Jamaica there was no hot water, no cable, and absolutely no air conditioning in 100 degree weather, but I was surrounded by the bluest ocean, around loving family, and eating the purest food. There was absolutely nothing not to be happy about.
Feel Free,
Mel
Inspiration and Inconveniences: Why You Should Welcome Them Both
It’s at 2 a.m in the midnight hours that I want to do something productive. It doesn’t matter that in approximately 1 hour and 26 minutes a new born will be interrupting me with a cry of hunger, or that I should be sleeping because I have to wake up in 4 hours for work. Inspiration has no sense of time or circumstance. It comes like a gush of wind and when it does you can’t just jump off the wave. You must ride it out.
It’s at 2 a.m in the midnight hours that I want to do something productive. It doesn’t matter that in approximately 1 hour and 26 minutes a new born will be interrupting me with a cry of hunger, or that I should be sleeping because I have to wake up in 4 hours for work. Inspiration has no sense of time or circumstance. It comes like a gush of wind and when it does you can’t just jump off the wave. You must ride it out.
No matter how much structure you put in place, life is filled with a whole bunch of inconveniences.
What do you do when you’re doing one thing but something yanks you to do something else?
Now if you’re sleeping but are urged to work on your passion, that can be an inconvenience you invite into the present. But sometimes it’s the opposite. You’re working on your passion and something less exciting but more demanding grabs your attention: your job, an important phone call, or a crying baby.
This situation can be frustrating but we all have responsibilities that must be taken care of whether or not we're willing.
You may have said, if I had more money I could pay someone to take care of this, that and the other. Then I could spend all day practicing my craft, meditating, working out, or just getting things done that I actually want to do.
But we all know life is not that convenient. As much as we daydream, as much as we decorate our ideal future with no problems or distractions, and fill it with infinite bliss, that is not a reality. Life is messy, uncomfortable, and forever compromising with time and desire.
Don’t get ruffled when inspiration or inconvenience hits. That is a sign passion is brewing inside you and life has not forgotten you. Your existence matters to someone or something other than yourself and you must answer whenever you are called.
Take each as it comes and give great energy, effort, and attitude towards both. When frustration rears its ugly head, squash it. The things we must do and the things we want to do must find its place in each and every day.
Feel Free,
Mel
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Rejection is Your Protection
Thank you for your interest in being part of our organization. Although we are impressed by your accomplishments, at this time we cannot offer you an opportunity to interview. Thank you again. This is one of several emails I have received from various companies. Day after day, I spend hours going through tedious applications and putting my best foot forward in hopes of receiving a call back from one company that believes I would be a good fit for an open position.
In return, I get to read through rejection letter after rejection letter until that call comes.
“Rejection has the ability to tap into a very sensitive area within us.”
It has the ability to make us feel inadequate, unnoticed, unworthy, and unwanted. We grow up learning that if we are rejected by someone then there is something not quite right with us. It could be how we look, how we do things, or where we are from.
Just because we are rejected by someone does it really mean something is not right within us or this would not be a good fit for you and that other person.
Sometimes we want things that are not meant for us or good for us. It is easy to believe that because you want something then you should surely have it. But there is something or someone out there that actually knows what is meant for us even when we cannot see it for ourselves.
In order to get us closer to that divine intersection, in order to find that thing that fits into our lives like a puzzle piece, certain situations, people, and opportunities must be denied our attention. If it is not, the most precious thing of all will be wasted, time.
When someone you like doesn’t call you back, a job does not offer you a position, or someone denies you their friendship, do not waste time thinking about how if you were this, or better at that, then maybe this would not have happened. Think of that rejection as your protection from something sour and a setup for something sweeter.
Be grateful that none of your precious time will be wasted on something that you would eventually no longer want in your life.
Rejection has the ability to prepare you for what is rightfully yours and yours alone.
Feel free,
Mel