00:00 

Hey there, this is Tanya Hale with Intentional Living and this is episode number 143, "Happy Being Unhappy." Welcome to your place for finding greater happiness through intentional growth, because we don't just fall into the life of our dreams...we choose to create it. This is Tanya Hale and I'm your host for Intentional Living. 

00:21 

Alright, hello there, my friends. So glad to have you here with me today. Thanks for being here. First of all, I am going to go back on a promise that I made. Last week, the podcast was on perfectionism and I promised that I would come in this week and talk about moving out of perfection. And I was working on that and working on that and working on that and I think I'm not ready to share that one yet because I'm not really good at it yet. So that's still is something that I'm really focusing on learning to manage my mind around a lot better. So I think until I'm in a better place with that, that one's just going to have to hold off because I need to be able to speak from a place of my experience and the things that I can really speak to at this point and moving out of perfectionism is still a work in progress for me. 

01:21 

So instead, this week, we're going to talk about happy being unhappy and I love this idea so much. I just can hardly wait to share it with you. So I want to start off with the scripture from the Pearl of Great Price. Remember that scripture where the Lord is talking about spirits in the pre-earth life and coming down to earth and God says "we will prove them now herewith." Prove us by giving us challenges and experiences so that we can prove our faithfulness and our desire to return to live with Him. And inherent in that is that our purpose in coming to this earth was to be tested, to be tried, to be proven, to see if we really desire to be back with God again. And we knew that that was the plan. We accepted that that was the plan, and guess what? We even rejoiced that that was the plan, to come down and to be tested and tried and proven. And we fully anticipated that there would be ups and downs and challenges and trials and difficult things and amazing things. We knew that that was part of the plan in the pre-earth life. We knew that and we were for it and we said, "yes, let's do this." 

02:33 

Now, this is a fascinating idea that I've kind of happened upon this last week. Satan knows that plan. He knows that our purpose is to be tested and tried and to grow and to develop and to find the person inside of us that we are meant to be. And he wants to thwart that. He wants to make it so that we do not find that person, that we do not step closer into our divinity. And so I believe that he's put this clever little plan in place to distract us from what really matters here. And that is the happily ever after story, the myth, I'm gonna call it even, right? I think he has put out this idea for us that we should be happy all the time. Because if he can get us to believe this, he can put us in a place of self-doubt and God-doubt. He can make us believe that we're always doing it wrong. "If I was doing it right, I wouldn't have all these challenges," right? 

03:44 

We tend to hear that thought and think that thought sometimes. We think that God doesn't love us if things are challenging. If God really loved me, He wouldn't do this to me. We have these kinds of thoughts out there. We start to question our worth when there are struggles and trials. And these are all things that I think Satan is so happy to have us thinking. If he can make us think that we need to be happy all the time, that we should be living in this happily ever after, that happiness is our birthright, then he has got a pretty good game plan going on. Because those kinds of thoughts, "I'm doing it wrong, God must not love me," those thoughts hold us back from stepping into what our true birthright is. And that is to step into our divine nature, what we have been created to be. 

04:43 

So when we think about "happy all the time," the exact opposite is true in God's plan. And it's because God loves us that we have these challenges and these trials, that we have these struggles that we have. He wants us to become our greatest potential. And to me, that's very evident in the fact that we have inside of us this innate yearning for growth, for moving forward, for evolving into a better version of ourselves. And I 100% that this is a God given gift. It drives us to pursue hard things, to experience growth, and thereby to experience the kind of happiness that really we are meant to have. And that's not a happiness that is founded in a place of no challenges or trials. The kind of happiness that we're talking about here is an uncomfortable process. This life that we've been given, that we've been sent down here to live and to be proven. It's an  uncomfortable process. And guess what? That's okay. Because that is part of the plan, that it's uncomfortable. Part of the plan that it's difficult. We can learn to enjoy this uncomfortable process because we know what it will ultimately create in our lives. We know who we will ultimately become in our life. This uncomfortable process creates us, our greatest selves, to become our highest potential and contribute to the world in the way that we were created to contribute. Our divine nature, our divine calling. 

06:32 

So at some level, we have to start changing the definition of happy in order to live and pursue our dreams. Rather than defining happiness as "no conflict, no difficulty, no challenges," we can learn to define it as "growing into our potential. Fulfilling the purpose of our life, becoming the greatest version of our self." So we have to ask this question, what really is happiness? And why do we want it? Let me suggest to you that we don't always want happiness because happily ever after is boring. How many movies start with the concept of happily ever after? They don't, right? They jump in the struggles and the trials and the challenges because happily ever after is boring. You know, going to a tropical beach for a week or maybe two would be fabulous, right? To really just like sit on the beach every single day, have somebody bring us food. That might be really fabulous for a bit. But guess what? What if we did that for the rest of our lives? What if we did that for a month or two months or two years or 10 years? We would get so bored. The reason we love the books and the movies is because we love the struggle. We love to see people move through the struggle. We love to see them overcome the struggle. We are more engaged in movies and books and other people's lives when there is a struggle. I find it fascinating that some of my most listened to podcasts are the ones about my divorce. People love the struggle. They love to see that. We, guess what, are more engaged with our own lives as well when there is struggle. We're more engaged. We're more focused. We're more intent. And yes, we're even more happy because we feel that growth and that progression. 

08:44 

And going back to this idea that we don't always want happiness, we want to be sad when sad things happen. When my parents died, I wanted to be sad. I didn't want to move into this place like "well, I know they're in a better place and so it's just all great," and do I believe that? Yes, for sure. I believe that they're in a better place. But did I want to be happy that they were gone from the physical existence of my life? Absolutely not. I wanted to be sad. I wanted to cry. The contrast between the happy, the growing and progressing and the challenge, this helps us to know the happiness. It helps us to find the true satisfaction and fulfillment in life when we get to the other side when things start to settle down. We've kind of been taught in our society to think that changing the circumstance will bring happiness. But the circumstance doesn't create happiness or unhappiness. Remember the circumstance is always neutral and we cannot give away our power to the circumstance. All of our power resides in the ability to choose our thoughts. Our thoughts regarding a circumstance are what creates happiness. Our thoughts are our creative power, the power of life, the power to create the life we want. And we tend to think we all want a life of ease, but we really don't. 

10:25 

There are simple pleasures in life: sitting and Netflixing and binge watching a show and scrolling social media. These simple pleasures like reading books every day, novels, they create a lower level of happiness for sure. They're comfortable, they're easy and there is a level of contentment there, but they do not make us feel alive. And the purpose of our life is to live, to feel alive, not just to exist. The history of the world shows us that that challenges have always been and will always be a part of the human experience. But somehow we think that if we can fix all the circumstances, that then we will be happy. But that's never the case. How many times have you changed the circumstance thinking that once this is over, we're all really happy, and we're not? How many times are you chatting with people that are like, "when this week's over, then I'll be able to do this? When this month is over, when I get through doing this, then everything's going to be better." It never works that way because as soon as we get through this week or this weekend, then guess what? Next week, there's a whole new set of circumstances. And so we have to stop giving our power to the circumstance and step back into the power of our thoughts. 

11:46 

It is important for us to start finding our happiness in the journey and not in the end result because, guess what? Temporally? The end result of this earth life will always be death. We think that we're gonna get there and what? Like we we definitely believe that our spirits go on, but temporarily, the end of this journey is death So our happiness is to be found in the journey not in the end result. The joy is in the journey. I know that's kind of a trite, overused phrase, but that is the truth. So how do we move into enjoying the journey, of really feeling alive, of engaging with our lives, even lives that are filled with struggle and triumph and sadness and joy? How do we engage in that? How do we enjoy that? How do we really learn to accept the 50-50 of life? 

12:42 

I think one of the first things we have to do is to give up that idea that our purpose in life is to be happy all the time. If we put happiness in the thought model, happiness goes in the f-line, the feeling line, and what does a feeling always create? Action. So if I'm happy, what actions does that create? It creates relaxation. It creates resting. It creates chilling. And I'll tell you what, my friends, those things are great for a breather. They are not great for feeling purposeful, for feeling determined and strong and capable and resilient, and feeling alive. To feel those which brings amazing fulfillment in our lives. We have to be going through the difficult. We can learn to be delighted with feeling the difficult emotions with the living of life. We can learn to be delighted with our 50-50 humanity. We can learn to stop trying to get happiness out of circumstances or out of activities, rather than out of our thoughts. Move instead into the acceptance of our difficult emotions, because this is what increases growth. This is where we feel momentum and progress. Creating this acceptance of our difficult emotions begins with our thoughts. Circumstances happen. They just happen. We can't control most of the circumstances in our lives. But the experience of what we have in that circumstance comes because of our thoughts about the circumstance. 

14:31 

If a challenging circumstance comes across my life path and I think "this shouldn't be happening to me, this is wrong. God doesn't love me. I'm doing it wrong," this does a couple of things. One, those thoughts create unhappiness. They create unsettledness. They create unsatisfaction. And so now we've taken a difficult circumstance and we've doubled the challenge by creating this unhappiness on top of it, that it's going wrong, I'm doing it wrong. We've doubled the unhappiness. We've doubled the struggle. The circumstance can be a struggle. But if I add thoughts like "this shouldn't be happening to me, God doesn't love me," that multiplies the difficulty. Okay? We have the struggle of the difficult circumstance and the struggle of our thoughts when we do that. When we think we should be happier, we're adding unhappiness in not being happy that we're not happy. Right? So we're just layering this unhappiness. We're layering the struggle. The resistance to the experience adds negativity to the already challenging trial. We've doubled the struggle. 

15:54 

But when we can learn to release the expectation that we should be happy all the time, we start to balance out that equation. We can go through a challenge and then instead of thinking it shouldn't go that way, we can embrace the struggle. We can work our way through it. We can balance out that struggle with feelings of determination and resilience and purpose and strength and capability. If we can stop feeling bad about not being happy all the time, we will step into being happier. We release the pressure of the should. I should be happier. I shouldn't have to go through this. When we can release that, then we're in a better place. Being unhappy over difficult emotion and difficult circumstance slows our growth because it doubles that challenge. Right? It slows our momentum. It slows our progress. But when we can come out of the other side of a challenge stronger, more capable, more resilient, more determined, this is when we really feel the greater happiness that we are seeking. So this is when we feel like we've come out living life, growing, and progressing. 

17:18 

So here's the thing. Happiness is not the best feeling that we can have. And we've touched on this. Oftentimes happiness is confused with pleasure. Pleasure and happiness, that kind of happiness, pleasure happiness, often leads us into being stagnant, a place of no growth and no progress. And stagnant does not bring strength, growth, engagement, the feeling of being alive. What makes us feel alive is the challenge and our ability to overcome the challenge. It's like a physical workout. The best workouts I have are the ones where I walk out feeling like a little bit shaky, where my face is totally red, where my shirt is wet. Those really hard, challenging workouts, those are the ones that make me feel alive. I have workouts where we just stretch sometimes, and they're great and they're nice, but I don't feel that drive and that push and that aliveness after those. So to live in our true humanness, we have to embrace our ability to feel and accept all of the emotions. To live in determination, in purpose, in resolution to ourselves, to our growth and our progress, this is the kind of happiness that we seek, not the relaxing on a beach for 10 years. 

18:52 

The contrast of human emotion is what brings this greater happiness that we're looking for. Even God told us in The Book of Mormon that there must be opposition in all things, because this is what elevates the joy, what elevates our lives, what elevates our humanness. We can expand our living when we learn to be happy with being unhappy, when we can find joy in the journey, power in the process, or contentment in the challenge. We can have happiness all of the time just by changing our thoughts. We really can. But is this really what we want? Do we want to be happy when human injustices are occurring, when a loved one is struggling or dies? What we really seek in life, what our souls really desire, is the ability to be strong in  the most challenging of times, to be resilient and able to come out the other side a better version of ourselves, to be determined to keep going and not settle for less than we ultimately desire. What we really seek is to become the person we feel inside of us, the person begging to be seen and to be heard, to be allowed to engage with the world in the highest way she possibly can. 

20:20 

But giving her her freedom means we have to engage with life at a higher level. We have to embrace the challenges and not get hung up on false ideas that we should be happy all of the time. We have to embrace God's plan of happiness, which is challenges and struggles and trials that help us to grow and become the person we are destined to become, the person we were created to become. We have to have the courage to step into the fire rather than just relax on the beach. And when we summon that courage, we are summoning our greatest potential, our greatest life. So happy being unhappy. Yes, please. Bring on all the emotions, bring on all the experiences and let us show ourselves what we've got. 

21:29 

This is the process of growing up, embracing the challenges rather than resisting. Embracing them gives a 50% positive to the challenge, which is 50% negative. But if we resist, we're adding 50% negative resistance to 50% negative experience. We can balance the equation. This is what we are capable of doing. Okay, this is this can be challenging. If this is a struggle for you, guess what, my friends? This is what I do. I can help you learn to be happy being unhappy. I can help you step into this place. I can do this. It's what I do. And it's what you were meant to do, my friends, to step into your divine nature, your divinity, your greatest potential and live life in the best and greatest way possible. 

22:34 

Okay, if you've not left me a review, please do so. If you love this podcast, please share it with someone you can talk to it about. I love listening to podcasts and then I send them to my friends and then we have these...sometimes the discussions are just over text. Sometimes they're when we get together and we chat. But having these discussions about concepts like this are so important because then you will develop your own understanding. You will move into a better space of connecting with these ideas and being able to implement this into your life better. So have this discussion. If you don't have it with me, have it with somebody else. And so share this podcast, talk about it, discuss it. That, my friends, is what I've got for you today. Pretty good stuff, right? Loved it. I love preparing it. I love being able to share this with you. Okay, let's have an awesome week, shall we? And I will talk to you next time. Ciao! 

23:39 

Thank you so much for joining me today. If you would love to receive some weekend motivation, be sure to sign up for my free "weekend win" Friday email: a short and quick message to help you have a better weekend and position yourself for a more productive week. Go to tanyahale.com to sign up and learn more about life coaching and how it can help you get to your best self ever. See ya!