HAPPINESS IS IN THE HERE AND NOW
ARE YOU aware that you might have a happiness mortgage? Sorry, just when you thought one mortgage was plenty – perhaps I’ve now loaded you with two!
Allow me to point out what a ‘happiness mortgage’ is and then I’ll explain how to release yourself from it.
Have you ever heard yourself say the words ‘I’ll be grand when I get this sorted’. I hear it quite often with my clients and on the street. And it leads me to ask people ‘how long will it take? And how will you cope while you wait to feel grand’?
For some, achieving their goal, could be a long journey. It could take months, maybe even years. So in effect they are mortgaging their present (day to day) happiness for the promise of future happiness. The suggestion that happiness is future based and dependent upon completion is false. That way of thinking suggests that this ‘elusive’ happiness is always one step ahead. It isn’t.
Happiness is very much in the present moment. It comes down to your outlook. You can believe it is always just around the corner. Or you can work on your present happiness now. That shift in mindset is your choice to make.
When setting goals with clients I always remind them that they plan their future in the present. I also remind them not to become goal obsessed leaving them fixated on the future. My advice is to continue working on your self-development but try and have some goals that give you both present and future happiness. Not always possible, but that is the sweet spot that keeps your happiness mortgage free or certainly out of arrears. Running is a goal that fulfils this. You will feel great as you train up for a race. However, just like life, there can be obstacles that crop up along the way as you will read in our leaders’ diaries.