The Happiness Hypothesis

I’m reading a book right now called the Happiness Hypothesis and below is an excerpt I came across the other day that made me think…

“Happiness comes from between. Happiness is not something that you can find, acquire or achieve directly. You have to get the conditions right and then wait. Some of those conditions are within you, such as coherence among the parts and levels of your personality. Other conditions require relationships to things beyond you: Just as plants need sun, water and good soil to thrive, people need love, work and a connection to something larger. It is worth striving to get the right relationships between yourself and others, between yourself and your work, and between yourself and something larger than yourself. If you get these relationships right, a sense of meaning and purpose will emerge.”

http://www.happinesshypothesis.com/

Lately, I’ve been working a lot on trying to put things into perspective in my life, on trying to see the ‘silver lining’ in things and just “LET IT BE”. For the most part-it’s working, and I have been able to feel my spirit become more relaxed in situations where I would normally become tense. I feel good about that.

However, one thing I’ve been battling a lot with is the concept of taking this life journey alone. Recently, I’ve had more than one person say to me that if I loved myself enough-losing important people in my life would make no difference to the level of my happiness, because at the end of the day-I’m the only one who can truly determine whether or not I’m happy, or how happy I am. Frankly, I’m just not sure I agree with that. While I agree that self love is extremely important and necessary, I think we are built to have relationships with others, short, long and everlasting. I think we are meant to lean on people during difficult times, and are to be leaned on in the same respect by others. I have always tried to be the person to never shut a door on someone who needs my ear to listen, no matter who or what it is. And I’m a strong believer in the power of human interactions being central to our life on this earth. I mean, how fun would it be to laugh alone, cry alone, dance alone, celebrate alone, sing alone (well that is kinda fun)-but you get my point.

I’ve even been told that I care too much! Is that even possible? I didn’t know it was. But I guess we are meant to love and lose, and love again and keep loving, because to me that’s what makes my world. It isn’t loving myself, but being able to share my love with others that brings me the most happiness.

Just a thought… Comments welcome ;) 

the Freakin NEVER ENDING TO DO LIST!

QUESTION to my faithful blog followers... or rather just anyone & everyone who happens to read this post.

What are some USEFUL strategies you use when you are feeling extremely overwhelmed with your "TO DO" list for life??

I sometimes have a lot of trouble with this and end up over reacting or breaking down when I could have prevented it!

Comments welcomed and very much appreciated :)

So much bigger than the gold

I’ve battled with the idea of talking about my swimming career on this blog for a long time now, thinking of the pros and cons of sharing; for myself, and for others. To tackle this fear, I’ve done a lot of thinking, reading, talking and most importantly listening to those in my life whom I look up to, and to those who have accomplished things I hope to accomplish one day (in the water & out). By doing this, I’ve noticed one reoccurring theme-we ALL struggle.

This is something that has helped me a lot lately- realizing, understanding and absorbing the struggles of everyday life-because that’s all it is-LIFE. Have you ever heard the saying “don’t make a mountain out of a mole hill?” Well that was me, pretty much all the time, about everything! Yes, I’ll admit it, I was that person who made everything a ‘thing’. I didn’t realize it when I did it, (no one ever does), but I was much more negatively minded that positively. Don’t get me wrong…this blog post is not going to be about how to make all your thoughts positive (because I am still of the belief that that is humanely impossible~but I’ve been proven wrong before), but rather about ‘absorbing’ the struggles and not reacting to them.

One thing I want to note is that struggle is a form of being that we should all start to become more comfortable with. I know this may be hard to come to grips with, because every inch of our man made environment tries to convince us otherwise (diet pills, plastic surgery, the ‘shake’ weight, “How to lose weight without exercising or eating healthier” (I’m pretty sure that someone is going write a book with that title soon) but that is not life-that is commercial TV advertising, and it stops there. Life is a struggle, day in and day out, it’s not easy and it never becomes ‘just right’. This is what I’ve had to learn through my swimming.

I’ve had numerous moments when I wanted to quit swimming (I know-shocking right? LOL), luckily for me, I’ve never allowed myself to get to that point because there was always something inside, holding me back, something telling me that I wasn’t finished just yet. I kept on. I wanted to quit again. I kept going. And again-and I kept going. And so here I am today, still going.

It took me a while, but finally after all the thinking, reading, talking & listening, I figured out what that ‘thing’ was. And guess what-It’s all of YOU.

It was said to me once that

“If you’re mission is bigger than the ‘gold’, you can’t not get the gold. The ‘gold’ is ON the way, not IN the way.”

Let me explain…

I spent years swimming every single race thinking about myself, and only myself. I would think about a specific goal time or place that I wanted to hit, or a person that I wanted to please. I thought that if I didn’t keep these things at the forefront of my mind, that I would fail. Funnily enough, I always swam my fastest when I didn’t think about these things (so I’m not quite sure why it’s taken me so long to get here-but hey, I’m just thankful). After ‘failing’ at so many races, I started to question my swimming, why I was doing it, and why I wasn’t getting any faster (this was me reacting to my struggle, rather than absorbing it). I knew it wasn’t physical, because it wasn’t showing up in practice-but only in a race. I thought about these things so much that I lost sight of the real joys of the sport and how much I had already gained from doing it. Then it hit me… that extremely hot day in Madagascar when I went for a dip in the ocean (refer to blog post “A little piece of heaven” if you don’t know what I’m talking about).

Long story short, I realized that my love for swimming was not for fast times or gold medals, but for the amount of people I could reach in a positive way through the skills I’ve gained from the sport. I then thought about all the ‘material’ joys I had experienced throughout my swimming career, and what it was that brought me so much happiness from these achievements-and it all came down to YOU.

YOU-the child who learned how to swim under my watch

YOU-the children who will go to the Olympics and win medals for The Bahamas

YOU-the multiple Bahamian children who have attended and will attend University on a swimming scholarship

YOU-The Bahamian public who now semi-follow swimming

YOU-the child that has and will break all of my swimming records

You see, it isn’t about me at all, but about the small difference I may make in the youth of my beloved Bahamaland and the world.

It is about absorbing the struggle, to reach a place that will touch not only myself, but others as well. And believe it or not, that tiny, minute difference it SO MUCH BIGGER THAN THE GOLD.

How are you?? Really...

HOW ARE YOU?

How are you? This is a question asked millions of times a day, all over the world in countless different languages and forms and a lot of the time, it doesn’t even receive an answer. Have you ever seen someone you know, but not well enough to stop and have a conversation and had a conversation that went something like this:

You: Hey!

Them: Hi! How are you?

You: I’m good, how are you?

Them: they smile…and kind of nod, and keep walking past

Yeah, don’t lie, you know that happens to you at least once a day! (just pay attention tomorrow if you still don’t agree) Well I thought of this saying today, and for some reason, it really struck a cord. We rush through this life, day in and day out, year in and year out for some of us, never stopping to really think about this question-How are YOU doing? Forget about the rest of the world-but in order to give your best to those around you, you must first understand how you are doing, and unless you get to that point, I don’t think you can really begin to truly care how others are doing. I sometimes find myself so wrapped up in what I am going through, that I can’t even begin to empathize with what others may be dealing with-even those that I see everyday.

However, I’ve also noticed that when I do take the time to really ask and try to understand how someone else is doing, it often helps me put how I am doing into perspective-and more often than not, I realize that I’m overreacting, or I at least realize that I’m not the only one.  

Rule # ONE: You’re NEVER the only one.

Not sure where this is going…but for those who may be reading, and for the even braver ones who have decided to start their journal-I want you to take a moment, and write down how you are doing. This doesn’t have to be in the form of an eloquent story or even longer than one line, just write-whatever you are feeling at the moment or have been for the past few days write it down!

Here’s mine:

How are you Alana?

I am fine. No I’m not, I’m sad sometimes, and happy at others. I am thankful. I am strong. I am resilient. I am emotional. I am crying. I am laughing. I’m swimming, I’m thinking. I’m doubting, I’m believing. I’m scared, I’m lonely. I’m loved. I love. I want to be loved. I am loving myself. I’m watching. I’m observing. I’m reading. I’m trying to understand. I understand, I don’t understand. I will get there. How are you? I am insecure. I am beautiful. I am caring. I am selfish. I am kind. I am thoughtful. I am true. I am bold. I am ME.

That felt good! Try it… it’s kind of empowering. The thing is…if you don’t even know how you are, how can you care how I am, or how anybody else is? And it’s so stupid because everyone walks around saying “I’m good, how are you?” when most of the time, they are NOT good, and they are NOT listening to how you are.

So this is my challenge to you, try to start your week with doing the exercise above, and then try to spend your week really listening to how others are doing. Reach out to a friend who you know is struggling and ask how they are doing-really doing. Share a few moments…and you’ll probably both realize that you’re both having a little bit of a stressful day, or week-and chances are, you’ll feel a little better, just knowing that you’re not the only one.