[SPEAKER_04]: I'm Julie Craftscheck, and I'm UASU.
[SPEAKER_04]: This is the Psychology of Relationships.
[SPEAKER_04]: Once I'm in a relationship, then I'll be happy.
[SPEAKER_04]: It's a belief so many of us hold, quietly or loudly.
[SPEAKER_04]: That love will finally unlock our sense of worth, peace, or joy.
[SPEAKER_04]: But spoiler, it doesn't always work that way.
[SPEAKER_04]: It's not to say that relationships won't bring you happiness, especially when you're with the right partner.
[SPEAKER_04]: But it's up to us to increase our happiness-based lines through our own self-worth.
[SPEAKER_04]: We know through hedonic adaptation, our brains will return to a baseline level of happiness.
[SPEAKER_04]: Even after major life changes, like falling in love, getting married, or achieving a long desired goal, that initial joy fades faster than we expect, and suddenly we're looking for the next thing to make us feel better.
[SPEAKER_04]: We think being in a relationship, or better yet being married,
[SPEAKER_04]: is key to our happiness, but a study by Michigan State University professor Richard Lucas reported that on average people only got a one-tenth of a point bump in happiness on an 11-point scale when they got married.
[SPEAKER_04]: Now that's less than 1% for any math nerds out there.
[SPEAKER_04]: The study also found that just as many people reported being less happy posed marriage as reported being more content after they tied the knot.
[SPEAKER_04]: In short, marriage made the same number of people happier as
[SPEAKER_04]: In this episode, we're joined by Rob Mack, celebrity happiness, coach, author, and expert and positive psychology.
[SPEAKER_04]: To explore why happiness doesn't begin after the relationship, it starts within.
[SPEAKER_04]: We talk about how to build happiness that's self-sourced and sustainable.
[SPEAKER_04]: how to leave relationships that drain you and why it's essential to choose a partner who supports your happiness rather than expecting them to supply it.
[SPEAKER_04]: Because real love isn't about filling a void when two people come together already full, grounded in their own joy, purpose, and self worth.
[SPEAKER_04]: They're not trying to complete each other.
[SPEAKER_04]: Instead, they're choosing to support each other.
[SPEAKER_04]: That's the foundation of a healthy, resilient relationship.
[SPEAKER_04]: One built not on kneadiness, but on mutual respect, emotional maturity, and interdependence, not dependence.
[SPEAKER_04]: Now remember to go to Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts and leave us a rating and review.
[SPEAKER_04]: And better yet, a comment about what you learned from this episode.
[SPEAKER_04]: This is the psychology of relationships and you're listening to an episode that just might change the way you show up for love.
[SPEAKER_04]: Enjoy!
[SPEAKER_04]: At the end of the day, on our podcast, anything we talk about, it all is geared towards the goal of happiness.
[SPEAKER_04]: Everybody just wants to be happy, right?
[SPEAKER_04]: There's nobody out there that's like raising their hands and saying, no, I'd rather be emo on my life.
[SPEAKER_04]: So outside of everything that's expected of us when it comes to dating relationships and marriage, ultimately we're looking for our person.
[SPEAKER_04]: And some of us believe that our person will also make us happy.
[SPEAKER_04]: So we can debate that a little bit later, if we want to.
[SPEAKER_04]: Hi.
[SPEAKER_02]: Thanks for having me.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, we're so excited.
[SPEAKER_04]: I'm just happy seeing your face.
[SPEAKER_04]: Exactly.
[SPEAKER_04]: Such a big smile, happiness and happy are words that are thrown around a lot.
[SPEAKER_04]: And I actually had to look up the definition because what is the definition of happiness.
[SPEAKER_04]: Happiness is a feeling or showing pleasure or contentment.
[SPEAKER_04]: the what a crazy definition or fortunate and convenient is another definition of happiness.
[SPEAKER_04]: This is not good definitions.
[SPEAKER_04]: It does not even do the word any justice.
[SPEAKER_04]: So Rob, how would you describe or define what happiness is?
[SPEAKER_02]: I would say that happiness is peaceful aliveness, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's the experience of peaceful aliveness that underlies all experiences, conditions, circumstances, thoughts, feelings, sensations, perceptions, all of that.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so I'd say that happiness isn't just what you do, or what you feel, or what you think, happiness is essentially what you are.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I like to feel a little abstract and esoteric for folks, I think, but yet sort of the very essence and very core of who and what you are.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so another word for happiness is simply peace or life, peacefulness, but it's definitely a peace that feels alive.
[SPEAKER_04]: I like that better than contentment.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I think a lot of us probably think of happiness or experience that it's something that can sometimes feel a little saccharine, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: It feels a little, you know, authentic.
[SPEAKER_02]: Or it feels like it's just about this emotional roller coaster that we take in experience.
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's at high, of some kind.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's an emotional high.
[SPEAKER_02]: We might associate it with pleasure.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, happiness is pleasurable, but it doesn't equate to pleasure.
[SPEAKER_02]: Right, happiness feels good, but it's not only good feelings, you know, there's a deeper felt sense of peaceful lifeness, it's lasting, meaningful, and abiding that underscores and underlies all experiences, but that's not something I knew at the beginning of my happiness journey.
[SPEAKER_03]: So, that brings us to a good question, because I'm dying to do.
[SPEAKER_03]: What got you into a kind of happiness industry?
[SPEAKER_03]: Were you always just happy go lucky or what was your story?
[SPEAKER_02]: I was suicidal, believe it or not.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I am the biggest, the person to be a happiness coach.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I feel like it was born and happy.
[SPEAKER_02]: I was deeply depressed and stressed out, anxious, self-loathing, self-hating, insecure.
[SPEAKER_02]: I thought I would grow out of it, you know I thought I'll do okay, maybe hopefully academically, athletically, socially, eventually financially and all of that happened, you know I did do pretty well on the sports field, I did go on the classroom, I have actually had some friends, I had a girlfriend, I had a great consulting job but dysphoria which really became depression.
[SPEAKER_02]: eventually got worse and worse and I mentioned that to a place where I was seriously suicidal.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I was experiencing suicidal ideation dozens of times a day and so to a place where I decided I was going to do some research.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so I looked for means where method to kill myself that I had access to that didn't feel too violent.
[SPEAKER_02]: Decided I was going to slash my wrist.
[SPEAKER_02]: So what did the kitchen that a kitchen knife?
[SPEAKER_02]: talking to my wrist, still have the suicide test marks there or my wrist to this day, but it's something very strange and unpredictable happen in the middle of that experience, which is that for no good reason without the external conditions or circumstances of my like changing at all, I mean, I had a pretty good life externally, objectively.
[SPEAKER_02]: The inside, I just felt this sense of peace and joy and inexplicable love that I hadn't really ever experienced before.
[SPEAKER_02]: So in that moment I decided I was going to postpone suicide for just like 15 minutes, like it wasn't very long, you know, even that felt like a very tall vicious order and it felt really impossible to wait that long.
[SPEAKER_02]: But I did some research in that period of time and for a long time discovered most importantly that I wasn't alone.
[SPEAKER_02]: And there were some people out there that were much wiser and maybe smarter than me that had figured out a way out.
[SPEAKER_03]: Mmm, so you can come back from it you've realized.
[SPEAKER_02]: How old were you?
[SPEAKER_04]: Oh yeah.
[SPEAKER_04]: Well, that's that's quite the story.
[SPEAKER_04]: I've been reading a lot recently about how when we are in the womb where the happiest all of our needs are taken care of.
[SPEAKER_04]: You don't feel alone because you're tethered to another human being and once we come out of the womb we spend our lifetime chasing that feeling again.
[SPEAKER_04]: And I can definitely attest to the fact that I've been there as well.
[SPEAKER_04]: And it's a very dark place to be and to feel that loneliness is absolutely profound.
[SPEAKER_04]: So it's an incredible story.
[SPEAKER_04]: Thank you so much for telling us that.
[SPEAKER_04]: And what about your current clients who come to you for happiness coaching?
[SPEAKER_04]: I guess you could call it, are they also in a similar spot?
[SPEAKER_02]: Some of them are lots of them aren't, but they all share this roller coaster ride that is life and so they experience the ups and the downs and most of them they would have a question want to experience more ups and downs.
[SPEAKER_02]: Right, but not all of them are suicidal or depressed by long stretch, but lots of them, all of them, are very familiar with stress and anxiety and insecurity and frustration over well.
[SPEAKER_02]: Right.
[SPEAKER_02]: So, yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I think, to be alive is to, I think, recognize and experience the frustration, often, of dealing with the navigating life.
[SPEAKER_02]: And that's what they all share in common.
[SPEAKER_03]: Well, I think one of the reasons why dating can be so difficult is that it shines light to all of that.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's not really just about, you know, meeting other people.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's about really getting up with all your insecurities and fears and all the deep stuff that we've been suppressing for years.
[SPEAKER_03]: Like how do you see, you know, clients come to you in regards to dating with happiness?
[SPEAKER_02]: Such a great question, Julie.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I initially set up to be a happiness coach, mostly because I was trying to be happy myself.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so I didn't decide what would be happiness coach.
[SPEAKER_02]: I just want to be happy.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then over time, people noticed that no matter what I was up to, I was always carrying around my, like, don't kill yourself bucks.
[SPEAKER_02]: You don't want to keep it my little journal about, you know, I was tracking the happyness activities that were working in the ones that weren't.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so I always thought, well, maybe I'll help people by becoming happiness coach.
[SPEAKER_02]: But interestingly enough, most people, even to this day, that reach out to me, reach out because they're having relationship problems or dating problems.
[SPEAKER_02]: right and so most of us associate or can found happiness with relationship problems or with relationship fulfillment and supple in some way.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I said it most all of the people that I talk to are mostly frustrated by other people or the lack they're all.
[SPEAKER_04]: Absolutely.
[SPEAKER_03]: Right.
[SPEAKER_03]: Interesting.
[SPEAKER_04]: So, how do you help people relinquish that control?
[SPEAKER_04]: Where people feel like my happiness is dependent on finding someone else or dependent on someone else's behavior.
[SPEAKER_04]: How do you change their mindset?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so it's such a great question.
[SPEAKER_02]: You, I mean, I think first and foremost, we just start with the data points we've already all gathered.
[SPEAKER_02]: So if you look into the past, look into your life, notice how many things you've
[SPEAKER_02]: prayed for or hoped for or sent intentions around or visualized or wanted that you now have and then notice how you're no happier as a result of that in fact so large extent lots of people are much less happy as a result of all these realized goals and dreams and desires and so just recognizing that alone that there's no amount of money, no amount or the degree of youth or beauty that will ultimately lead you to living a happy life in a lasting meaningful and a binding way
[SPEAKER_02]: is pretty convincing, but then there's the pieces around science as well, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: We have lots of scientific data at this point, at least over two decades worth, you know, from places like University of Pennsylvania and Harvard and Claremont and University of Michigan, and you know, all that science basically says that no successful condition or combination of successful conditions,
[SPEAKER_02]: whatever guarantee you happiness in fact, there's a formula, happiness formula, and we know that only about 10% of your happiness is your chivetable to conditions.
[SPEAKER_02]: So certain scenes to conditions at all, 10% and that's the best case in here.
[SPEAKER_02]: So imagine your most perfect and ideal life, whatever that is, whatever that is, would only account for 10% of how happy or unhappy you are.
[SPEAKER_04]: And what's the other 90%?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes, of the other 90% is perfectly malleable.
[SPEAKER_02]: 50% is actually genetic.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we're all wild.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes, for more or less happiness.
[SPEAKER_02]: But that genetic component is itself changeable and plastic, which means that it's not like height or eye color that you can't be changed, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: Did something that's...
[SPEAKER_02]: completely changeable.
[SPEAKER_02]: And you can change a by the people that you hang out with and exercise activities that you participate in, food, weed, all that stuff.
[SPEAKER_02]: So that's 50%.
[SPEAKER_02]: The other 40% is the voluntary stuff, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's the choice you make around gratitude and again that people you hang out with and all that good stuff.
[SPEAKER_02]: So really 90%.
[SPEAKER_02]: perfectly within your control.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I'd argue that 10% also a lot more within our control that we realized if we're going to spend our time energy in a very precious life on this planet and trying to be happy, we don't want to spend it all or most of it, just trying to rearrange or organize it, sort of decks in the Titanic.
[SPEAKER_03]: So would you say it's fair to say that 90% is just mindset like how you view your current situation or is it a little more complex than that?
[SPEAKER_02]: I'd say that's a great way of describing it in a very simple way.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'd say at the end of the day it's, we could think about it in a place.
[SPEAKER_02]: One is, happiness is what you do.
[SPEAKER_02]: So, in any of our journey it's like, if you're doing things that make you miserable, but are to get fit for you and you're pursuing career, that is just not a good match or an inanimate with your personality or to meet your strengths, you're going to find it hard to be happy, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: So, happiness is definitely about doing happy things if it all possible.
[SPEAKER_02]: But then the second level is it's also about spending time with happy people or supportive people, loving people, encouraging people, healthy people, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: So there's that piece of it.
[SPEAKER_02]: But then the third level is definitely really about entertaining or at least exploring better feeling stories about your life and about the world in general, but in a way that's still true.
[SPEAKER_02]: So that is about lines and rates, it's about optimism and about gratitude and about hope, no question about it.
[SPEAKER_02]: But there's a fourth level in generally,
[SPEAKER_02]: Science doesn't talk too much about this, but it's not just about Happiness producing activities and happiness supporting individuals in people in your life and about Happy thoughts.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's also about no thoughts, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: There appears in our life a day where we're not thinking at all And if you notice more and more of those periods of no mind or no thought You'll see how you're already perfectly at peace and happy already without having to do any of the other things
[SPEAKER_04]: I don't know if I ever have a moment where I don't have any thoughts.
[SPEAKER_04]: This is why I'm so bad at meditation.
[SPEAKER_04]: This is probably why I should take up meditation.
[SPEAKER_04]: I don't know, silly.
[SPEAKER_04]: Are you the same?
[SPEAKER_03]: My mind is always racist.
[SPEAKER_03]: So it's always the people that can't do meditation.
[SPEAKER_03]: That should be doing it.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's right.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's kind of like lifting weights.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like, you know, we can say, I can't lift that five pounds, but the only reason we can't lift that five pounds is because we haven't tried that and that five pounds often.
[SPEAKER_02]: Right.
[SPEAKER_04]: Right.
[SPEAKER_02]: And the other thing just to say we're quickly is that all of us have gaps in our thoughts all day long, but we don't notice them.
[SPEAKER_02]: We usually rush past them.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know too quickly, so when you're experiencing tremendous pain or tremendous pleasure, there often is just a moment or a micromoment when your mind is perfectly still quiet.
[SPEAKER_02]: And if you were to notice those gaps in the traffic of your mind more consistently, you would quickly discover that the gaps widen and they also become more frequent.
[SPEAKER_02]: And in those gaps, essentially, these pregnant pauses and those pregnant pauses are really full of, like, what's called a bundle of joy but it's happiness.
[SPEAKER_03]: So we hear people all the time that's like, once I'm in a relationship, I'll be happy or once I'm married, I'll be happier.
[SPEAKER_03]: Once I've kids, I'll be happy.
[SPEAKER_03]: Would you put that in like the 10% that's more circumstance?
[SPEAKER_02]: Absolutely, absolutely.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, really, when you think about it, anything that you imagine will make you happy in the future, while it seems like an opportunity to be happy later, is really most obstacle to being happy right now.
[SPEAKER_02]: So, any of those if-then statements generally are a good indication that you're placing your happiness in the future in somebody or something else other than yourself.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then, is the primary cause of your happiness itself.
[SPEAKER_03]: Right, so what about people that are single, that just hate being single?
[SPEAKER_03]: Like how can you feel like happy in your current life stage or your situation are?
[SPEAKER_03]: You know, whatever it is, whatever stage you don't want to be in, essentially.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that's it.
[SPEAKER_02]: The first thing is, try to take your power back and stop if you can outsourcing what you feel to anybody or anything else or the lack of anything or anybody else.
[SPEAKER_02]: And one way to do it is simply, it's just,
[SPEAKER_02]: It's create a list called your happiness islands.
[SPEAKER_02]: Those are things people places that allow you to feel inspired and agized, uplifted, happy for no good reason, just for their own sake.
[SPEAKER_02]: And do what you can to spend more time with those people like activities, people ignore it in places.
[SPEAKER_02]: Also, notice the things that make you feel really miserable or drained for no good reason.
[SPEAKER_02]: We call those your happiness deserts.
[SPEAKER_02]: And do everything you can to spend less time with those people activities and places, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: And so that's a good first step.
[SPEAKER_02]: to begin to notice all of the incredible reasons that you have to be happy today despite not having a partner relationship.
[SPEAKER_04]: Do you believe that happiness can be addictive?
[SPEAKER_04]: That people want to keep chasing it before the wrong reasons and I ask this because
[SPEAKER_04]: I feel like once I feel happy, I want to constantly feel that feeling, so I'm chasing after people, things to make me feel that again, but that's not realistic.
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, yeah, I mean, and you bring them such a great question, you know, I love it so much.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, we become addicted to pleasure, you know, happiness, I would say we're not addicted to, only because it's something that is within us.
[SPEAKER_02]: And it is essentially us and so it's instead, I would say, you know, again, happiness is what you are.
[SPEAKER_02]: If you find yourself chasing a high of any kind, that's fine, you know, don't touch your self-port, but also realize and recognize that that's not happiness, like anticipation or pleasure isn't happiness.
[SPEAKER_02]: Happiness is pleasurable and it can be full of anticipation, but it's not the same thing.
[SPEAKER_04]: Okay, light bulb moment.
[SPEAKER_04]: I just want to repeat what you just said happiness is what you are.
[SPEAKER_04]: So it's a state of being and pleasure are those spikes and those are the highs that people chase after.
[SPEAKER_04]: But happiness is accessible anytime anywhere right now.
[SPEAKER_02]: you just nailed it.
[SPEAKER_02]: Beautifully said.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, really beautifully said.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like, yes, happiness is not a lifestyle status.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's not even a state of emotion or a state of mood, which is what most of us assume, it's a state of being.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's not even a state of mind.
[SPEAKER_02]: Although a state of mind will kind of lead you there a little.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's a state of no mind, it's a state of being itself.
[SPEAKER_02]: And that's the idea of being, you can kind of think of like, when you go to a movie or a movie, watch a movie.
[SPEAKER_02]: And the movie, we get all caught up in the characters in the action.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's so fun to watch, so scary to watch, and then it's sexy, and then it's gross, and we experience all the emotions.
[SPEAKER_02]: And the one thing that we don't really recognize or really remember very often is that it's all happening on this screen.
[SPEAKER_02]: That screen that basically absorbs or allows you to see the images on the screen.
[SPEAKER_02]: That screen itself is,
[SPEAKER_02]: immovable and shakable and indestructible, and it's perfect piece, that is screen.
[SPEAKER_02]: And no matter what happens on the screen, it's untouched really by what happens on the screen.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's screen itself is what I would describe as happiness itself and that screen is inside of you.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so no matter what happens on the surface of your life, the conditions, the circumstances, thoughts and emotions underneath it all, if you'd dive deep enough, you'd realize that that screen
[SPEAKER_02]: this perfect peaceful likeness always exists within you.
[SPEAKER_02]: And you can access that and experience that even as you experience the other things.
[SPEAKER_02]: And you can kind of bring that screen to the forefront of your experience of life.
[SPEAKER_02]: Instead of letting it always be in the background somewhere.
[SPEAKER_02]: But essentially what happens, the most of us is we forget that we're watching a movie, essentially.
[SPEAKER_02]: And we get so caught up in all the action and all the drama.
[SPEAKER_02]: And we go chasing, you know, and we don't really spend enough time just basically being.
[SPEAKER_03]: Well, I think what you said, like the addicted to pleasure, not happiness, is interesting, because I can see why people now tie happiness to relationships, because there's a lot of pleasure, you know, when things are going good, it's good.
[SPEAKER_03]: You mentioned your clients a lot of times come to you with relationships when they're unhappy or they're happy.
[SPEAKER_03]: Why do you think this is such at the forefront of people's perception of happiness?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, well, it's sort of easier for get that you are happiness and then to go seeking for that which you are without realizing it or recognizing, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: So another way to say that essentially is that, you know, we seek in our elusory.
[SPEAKER_02]: or erroneous perception of belief that we're, that we're half of a person, we're just part of a person, that we're not full, that there's something left here missing in our lives.
[SPEAKER_02]: We go to feel that up with something, anything.
[SPEAKER_02]: And usually, you know, another person just seems so, it's like, it's such a seductive idea.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like, why not?
[SPEAKER_02]: You with somebody else?
[SPEAKER_02]: Why not in a relationship?
[SPEAKER_02]: It just sounds fantastic.
[SPEAKER_02]: But if you look real closely, you'll notice that the challenge is that we haven't really come to enjoy or love our own aloneness.
[SPEAKER_02]: And we haven't
[SPEAKER_02]: dive deep enough within ourselves to discover that whatever it is we're looking for another person, we already have within ourselves, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: So even the experience of love, like, I don't need a partner to feel love, you know, I don't need a partner to feel happiness.
[SPEAKER_02]: And if that sometimes having a partner is the one thing that makes it an a way of you feeling the love that's inherently that's inside you, the happiness that's inside you, the pieces inside of you.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so, you know, it's understandable and we all have done it and we all
[SPEAKER_02]: continue to do it.
[SPEAKER_02]: We forget for a period of time that what we're looking for is not only within us, but is us.
[SPEAKER_02]: This is also where the science helps out a lot.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, science basically found that happy people essentially have better relationships of all kinds.
[SPEAKER_02]: Either they have happier relationships of all kinds, who's weak since.
[SPEAKER_02]: They also get married earlier, stay married longer, and are happy and all the relationships with it are married or not.
[SPEAKER_02]: They also, by the way, are rated as more attractive than they're unhappy counterparts.
[SPEAKER_02]: And it's not because they're actually physically more attractive.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's as having as itself is attractive.
[SPEAKER_02]: Right.
[SPEAKER_02]: And figuratively.
[SPEAKER_02]: Right.
[SPEAKER_02]: So the challenge of an opportunity is to find a way to be happy without a partner so that you can one day attract a partner more quickly and be happier in the relationships.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_03]: Absolutely.
[SPEAKER_03]: We actually had this really great quote that I want to read that it was the best advice I heard was to find someone who supports your happiness, not someone you need to depend on it.
[SPEAKER_03]: What are your thoughts about this quote and how can people start looking more inward?
[SPEAKER_02]: I love that so much.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I had Warren Buffett say something really interesting one time to ask him, what's the best piece of business advice you could possibly give?
[SPEAKER_02]: And he said, to make sure you're very selective and choose about your partner, you know, that you're romantic one, you know, who you choose for a husband or a wife or a girlfriend, girlfriend, whatever.
[SPEAKER_02]: feel that so strongly, because generally what happens in relationships is that we like to think that if we're happy enough, we can pull the other person up to our level of happiness.
[SPEAKER_02]: But that rarely, if ever, happens, what mostly happens is that the least happy person brings you down to their level, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: And so the first thing is to recognize that happiness relationships aren't designed to make you happy.
[SPEAKER_03]: That's like a big burst for people.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, the enhancer happiness, you know, if you're happy already, the enhancer happiness, but they're not designed to make you happy, they're designed to make you aware, and in your awareness, you can become happier.
[SPEAKER_02]: A lot happier.
[SPEAKER_02]: But that's the reason the challenge and the opportunity with relationships is not to look for happiness in them because again, you're outsourcing this thing that actually you are infinitely rich and wealthier.
[SPEAKER_03]: Right.
[SPEAKER_03]: I think Cheryl Sandberg says the thing very similar also about, you know, the partner is your greatest indication of success is who you choose as a partner.
[SPEAKER_03]: And I think I saw like a study somewhere that the most happy people just overall again, there's probably a lot of factors were people that were married in good relationships, what they consider good relationships.
[SPEAKER_03]: and then next was people that were single and then at the bottom where people that were in relationships that were, did not make them happy.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's so good to be like, you're right, you know?
[SPEAKER_02]: So a lot of the science, what it essentially says is that it's take marriage in an example, but you can take any relationship really.
[SPEAKER_02]: So most of us assume you get in relationship and get married.
[SPEAKER_02]: Of course, I'm happy.
[SPEAKER_02]: I love this person and it's great to me with our friends.
[SPEAKER_02]: But what happens with most people most everyone is that you experience a small,
[SPEAKER_02]: increase in your happiness when you first get married into that relationship.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then as soon as that honeymoon face is over, you experience a decline.
[SPEAKER_02]: And that happiness goes back to its original baseline level for a while.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then depending on whether or not you will get along very well.
[SPEAKER_02]: It will either, you know, stay at the baseline level or dip away below that.
[SPEAKER_02]: Right?
[SPEAKER_02]: And so the one, one of the key, you know, sort of factors in the happy relationship is of course is too happy, independent, like independently happy individuals.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's critical.
[SPEAKER_02]: The other thing is that it's the relationships where each partner sees the other and really positive light.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so they generally see that we call it positive illusion.
[SPEAKER_02]: But they see their partner, each of them sees the other in a way that is better than that person's five best friends, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: It's not even a positive light.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so it's interesting.
[SPEAKER_02]: So entertaining this positive level called illusion, but for them it's reality.
[SPEAKER_02]: entertaining that positive illusion about the
[SPEAKER_04]: There is this other argument that happiness is only felt when you've experienced the opposite.
[SPEAKER_04]: People who feel like, oh, when I go through sadness, I can really appreciate the happiness.
[SPEAKER_04]: What is your opinion about that?
[SPEAKER_04]: Is that something that we should take as the truth?
[SPEAKER_02]: So, it is true that contrast can make life really beautiful.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's the sour that makes the sweet, that much sweeter.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so, there's no question about that.
[SPEAKER_02]: And that also is a
[SPEAKER_02]: How do we know off without on?
[SPEAKER_02]: How do we know blooding that way?
[SPEAKER_02]: It was kind of difficult to kind of know these things or have these experiences.
[SPEAKER_02]: And that being said, the happiness I'm talking about is really a non-dual experience.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so anything that you perceive or sense or think to the mind is going to always be full of these opposites like this year in this year.
[SPEAKER_02]: And it's great, it's beautiful.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm like enjoy all no question about it.
[SPEAKER_02]: But I would say that happiness, again, is different from pleasure, which is always kind of about balance by pain.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's even not, I wouldn't even call it the opposite of what I'm happy is the half just I'm talking about is something that is, it has no opposite, it's the very ground of your being, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: So some people might even refer to it as God or cautious as itself or awareness itself, again, just words, but you're absolutely right in the sense that tough things can make.
[SPEAKER_02]: good things feel that much better and adversity can play an incredibly important role in our lives because it helps us appreciate things that we didn't appreciate before or as much before so it's prioritized relationships so yes you definitely want to do what you can to appreciate the adversity and the contrast in your life but also please try to explore this idea really this experience that happiness is something that transcends duality and something that exists is the very ground of your being.
[SPEAKER_04]: Fascinating.
[SPEAKER_03]: So I feel like you and I are real big proponents of mindset, like kind of what you were just saying around, you know, how do you start to see things in a different way?
[SPEAKER_03]: And I guess my question for you is, do you think that's the key to finding happiness or do you think there's other tools and techniques that you've used along the way?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, there's so many tools and I mean, there's so many exercises.
[SPEAKER_02]: I would say they kind of fall into like, I'm, I guess they're four buckets, but I'm sure we can break it down into a thousand buckets.
[SPEAKER_02]: But I would say, yeah, the one is just, you basically have full of four tools at your disposal.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like actions that you take, okay?
[SPEAKER_02]: So you want to do everything you can to try to take to happy your actions, okay?
[SPEAKER_02]: And sometimes you can't always tell what they happy your action is until you play it all the way out.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like for a lot of things.
[SPEAKER_02]: Drinking a lot of alcohol all the time.
[SPEAKER_02]: It feels like a great idea.
[SPEAKER_02]: Thank you for being able to do that.
[SPEAKER_02]: Then you have the hangover where you're like, look at that stuff and the activity that you do.
[SPEAKER_04]: There's duality with that, yes.
[SPEAKER_02]: There's lots of duality, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: So happy activities or actions.
[SPEAKER_02]: But then there's in happy people or loving people's order people.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then there's that you said, happy sort of mindset, we'll call it that.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so that's all about telling a better, fully story.
[SPEAKER_02]: based in truth about everything in your life.
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's like if you have zero dollars in your bank account, are you broke or is there only up from here, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: Right, right, right, is it a bad day?
[SPEAKER_02]: Or is it simply raining, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: And it'll be said tomorrow, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: So mindset absolutely.
[SPEAKER_02]: Now, that thing said that we'll take you but so far, we'll take you to the very edge right where you can sort of begin to actually dive all the way in to happiness.
[SPEAKER_02]: So the thing I discovered about, let's say, positive thinking.
[SPEAKER_02]: Even the most positive thinking,
[SPEAKER_02]: will not give you a perfectly positive life.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we're going to do this contrast, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: And if you know as an unique, most positive thing, you're still at this level of anxiety.
[SPEAKER_02]: Is the slow level of anxiety, which is right?
[SPEAKER_02]: And so it's kind of like still, it's better than negative thinking, way better, but it's still not quite it.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so you sort of take this leap.
[SPEAKER_02]: And this is where we get expressions like the piece that path of understanding, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: Or the eternal sunshine of this spotless mind.
[SPEAKER_02]: right?
[SPEAKER_02]: It's a speaking to this happiness that exists as a state of no mind, as a state of no thought.
[SPEAKER_02]: And that's kind of what meditation comes in very handy or precious in the presence.
[SPEAKER_02]: There are always other terms that some of the people use.
[SPEAKER_02]: But there is a happiness that can begin with happy activities and happy actions and then lead, happy people and also lead to happy mindsets.
[SPEAKER_02]: But then there's another step that you ultimately want to take that is beyond the mindset.
[SPEAKER_04]: So, baby steps first, open that door or just...
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_04]: I don't know, push it a little bit and then eventually it will fully open.
[SPEAKER_02]: Exactly, exactly.
[SPEAKER_02]: And what you'll notice is that that final step, like, think about that moment of rape before you fall asleep at night, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like, you're so tired, you don't move your body, you're so tired, you don't have many thoughts that it's like, rape before you sit up to sleep at that.
[SPEAKER_02]: One moment, rape before you, it's so blissful.
[SPEAKER_02]: At moment of no thought, you're not thinking anything,
[SPEAKER_02]: You're not doing anything, you're just so comfortable and you're comforting your pillows and all that stuff and you're not really, and then you're sleeping.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then known for eight hours, maybe dream a little bit, but you feel so refreshed in the morning and besides that dreaming part, most dreamless sleep is nothing but no thought, but it's so blissful, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: So we all have that experience.
[SPEAKER_02]: We're more familiar with that experience than we are in the females, but our mind will convince us otherwise, most days.
[SPEAKER_03]: I guess the only kind of counter I'd have to that is sometimes when you're doing nothing is that always the best state either, right?
[SPEAKER_03]: I mean, you're not taking any action, is that a good thing?
[SPEAKER_02]: Right, so here's the beautiful thing, and I love that point you make.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we sometimes think of being as opposite from doing, so it's like just do nothing.
[SPEAKER_02]: We think of it as the opposite of doing something.
[SPEAKER_02]: But when I would argue that there's a way of being that includes doing, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's like the runner who can run super fast, but inside in their mind, in their heart, the perfectly still, there's a relaxedness about it.
[SPEAKER_02]: They're totally at ease, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: So we're talking about that.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's more of a flow state.
[SPEAKER_04]: It's like flow state.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes, it's possible to be totally at ease.
[SPEAKER_02]: within your own skin totally ease with the world on the inside and not to be lost in discursive thinking and obsessive compulsive over analytical thinking and to just be on the inside or you take massive action on the outside.
[SPEAKER_02]: But your happiness doesn't depend on the Matt and that's of action you take and it doesn't depend on the results of the massive action you take because you're still always resting inside as what we call resting in God, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: Rest in presence.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's taking action sure or why not but it's not being lost in the
[SPEAKER_03]: So you have this quote on Instagram again that you don't have to seek happiness.
[SPEAKER_03]: You just have to stop seeking unhappiness.
[SPEAKER_03]: And I love that so much.
[SPEAKER_03]: I'd love for you to dive a little deeper in.
[SPEAKER_03]: But I think when I think of that quote as I think of people that are chasing situationships for instance, that it's clear that's not for you.
[SPEAKER_03]: I'm happy this yet they stick around or they're in a noticeably bad relationship.
[SPEAKER_03]: Why do you think one people do this and how can they stop seeking unhappiness?
[SPEAKER_02]: The first piece is, you know, the brain, beautiful problem solving instrument, is also a troublemaker.
[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, so the brain is built with all of dozens of biases, okay, and one of the major biases is the negativity bias, which means that the brain operates the way that a century of a ship does.
[SPEAKER_02]: Its job is to look for problems to solve and dangers to avoid, to keep you alive.
[SPEAKER_02]: So the brain is built for survival.
[SPEAKER_02]: not necessarily happiness, although it does a pretty good job of that as well.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so what that means is that the problem always gets our attention.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so while we think, almost an opportunity to be happy later, we've actually just identified a problem now, which is like, we're lacking this thing.
[SPEAKER_02]: Maybe it's more money, maybe it's a partner or a mutual relationship.
[SPEAKER_02]: But the brain has this negative theory device.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so we're always up against this beautiful brain that loves solving problems, but also loves creating problems as much as it loves solving, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: So that's the first thing.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's kind of like this idea when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail, but when all you have is a brain, and everything looks like a problem to be solved.
[SPEAKER_02]: So that's really the main sort of crux.
[SPEAKER_02]: of what often leads us down the past of that sort of unhappiness.
[SPEAKER_02]: And if you look at the rest of nature, I mean, most of nature is perfectly blissful.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, only human beings make a problem out of their own existence.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, even think about, like, only human beings really kill just to kill, like, because it's coming from, like, there's something unhappiness here, or, like, most animals in the, you know, in a kingdom, they kill the eat, but they don't just kill their child, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: Survive, right, or whatever.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so, just notice the ways in which, yes,
[SPEAKER_02]: we think we're so civilized as human beings.
[SPEAKER_02]: We're also, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: We also create a problem out of our own existence.
[SPEAKER_02]: And a lot of that is just, we love the brain for the prefrontal cortex.
[SPEAKER_04]: Well, the, also the problem with a lot of data is that we think we know what we're looking for and we think we know how to gauge if someone's a good partner.
[SPEAKER_04]: So even thinking about the traditional way of setting a barometer, how you would evaluate someone as a partner.
[SPEAKER_04]: People always say, does he make you happy?
[SPEAKER_04]: Does she make you happy and I think that is the wrong way of thinking about it because no person can ever make you happy, but I would ask this is person take away from your happiness.
[SPEAKER_02]: So good.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's so good.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's so poignant.
[SPEAKER_02]: You can profound.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's exactly right.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, it's like are they supporting you and your happiness, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: If it supports you in it,
[SPEAKER_02]: Like the greater question the better question is, yeah, are they taking away from it, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: You feel drained.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, I mean, I think we've all had experience where it's like you love someone very much and you feel such relief when they're not around, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like, oh, I love this person, but they feel so stressed and anxious when they're around and I feel so much relief when they're not around.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so that's also a good sign, but yeah, I love that.
[SPEAKER_02]: I love exactly what you framed it.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I mean, I definitely think happiness needs to come from within a hundred percent, but I do think being in a happy, healthy relationship is the word happy, but in a healthy relationship can make you happy.
[SPEAKER_03]: I feel it.
[SPEAKER_03]: Like, I guess is there a counter of that?
[SPEAKER_03]: Like, why?
[SPEAKER_03]: I guess if we're really saying that it really ships don't make you happy, why are we all chasing them?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so, so I'll say this in another point you're making, you know, relationships matter.
[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, there's no question relationship matter.
[SPEAKER_02]: And when we look at the science, we know that relationships matter almost more than anything else in terms of happiness.
[SPEAKER_02]: The difficulty in the challenge and the sort of misperception that we often have is that that social connection that you ultimately want to feel, has to come or should come or best comes through a romantic relationship.
[SPEAKER_02]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_02]: I would say that friendship is one of the highest forms of relationship in my mind.
[SPEAKER_02]: The kindness, kindness is what I really like.
[SPEAKER_02]: What I like about that about kindness, the kindness is the highest kind of love from my perspective.
[SPEAKER_02]: And if you think it only comes through, or most it comes through, or has to exclusively come through our romantic partner, you're setting yourself up for a lifetime of challenges, because it's like hoping that this one person will be this one-stop shop for all of your
[SPEAKER_02]: It's impossible for anyone else to do that for us when we can't even, or we haven't even done that for ourselves, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like most of us are asking others to do for us when we haven't been able to do for ourselves, which is like fully unconditionally love us.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like how many people have you met that have fully unconditionally loved themselves or even fully known themselves?
[SPEAKER_02]: And yet we're asking some strangers when we haven't met yet.
[SPEAKER_02]: Do it not just today, but forever.
[SPEAKER_02]: I love it and I want you to experience all of that when all of this experience all of that if that's our desire But if I was placing bets, I wouldn't put my money on that
[SPEAKER_04]: Well, Julie also have some thoughts about what you said because I've been thinking about this too, is it chicken or the egg, but I don't actually think it is chicken or the egg.
[SPEAKER_04]: I think we've been thinking about this backwards.
[SPEAKER_04]: When we've been in healthy relationships, we attribute it to our partner and our relationship.
[SPEAKER_04]: So therefore, you are able to recognize as a healthy relationship.
[SPEAKER_04]: I know I've been in relationships where I was not at a state of happiness.
[SPEAKER_04]: And I couldn't even recognize that it was a good relationship.
[SPEAKER_04]: I wasn't accepting of it.
[SPEAKER_04]: So I think we're just, we tend to put so much pressure and I guess credit to relationships.
[SPEAKER_04]: So we forgot that we are the instigator for holiday relationships.
[SPEAKER_03]: Right, I love that.
[SPEAKER_03]: So it's like, yeah, like obviously the person has to be a good partner, and contribute, they can't take away from it.
[SPEAKER_03]: But the reason you probably attracted that person to the first place is because you were in a good place.
[SPEAKER_03]: Exactly.
[SPEAKER_02]: So beautifully said, and if you think about it too, it's a great point.
[SPEAKER_02]: And think about this.
[SPEAKER_02]: Let's say that any of us were in a very happy relationship.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I would already because we were happy ourselves, and with these, it's easy to attract somebody.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, happy when we're happy.
[SPEAKER_02]: happiness of us company, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: But also, you know, think about why or how that relationship didn't last.
[SPEAKER_02]: Now why would that relationship that was so happy?
[SPEAKER_02]: Why would it not last if this other person was the source of our happiness?
[SPEAKER_02]: Makes no sense.
[SPEAKER_02]: Did they just stop deciding to provide the happiness that we were ultimately after?
[SPEAKER_02]: Or is there something else or more going on there, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: And so that's, you know, the questions I pondered at.
[SPEAKER_04]: Well, what did you answer?
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, I would say that just the answer is that they're not the source of your happiness.
[SPEAKER_02]: I would say that most people are, you know, are trying hard, but most of us kind of suck at being happy.
[SPEAKER_02]: And we certainly suck and making other people happy.
[SPEAKER_02]: We try hard, but we just don't always know whether itches.
[SPEAKER_02]: Even when they tell us itches, we don't always know.
[SPEAKER_02]: And not just that, but most of us are wired for self-interest.
[SPEAKER_02]: We just don't our thing, God, that lets us off the look, that lets them off the hook.
[SPEAKER_02]: We want to be happy.
[SPEAKER_02]: why for self-interest, because it means that we can just take over ourselves and in our abundance and overflow, money or time or energy or whatever, we can share it with other people.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so, we're just not wired to be anybody else's keeper in that specific way in terms of what we're meant to be.
[SPEAKER_03]: Mm.
[SPEAKER_03]: What if you're just not in a happy place?
[SPEAKER_03]: Is it better to postpone dating and work on yourself or is it better to meet someone and continuously do the work?
[SPEAKER_03]: Because I feel like we hear a lot of times like you need to work on yourself, but then you can also get into that endless cycle where you're never going to that, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I would say this way, you know, kind of sometimes say, you'll never go to the grocery store when you're hungry
[SPEAKER_02]: junk food right and never go to the dating pool when you're unhappy right like that's generally gonna also end up with some junk experiences and relationships now challenge with that is some of it's just feel like we have no other option or we're just so into it we just have to do it and listen that's perfectly fine too because I promise you'll have enough experiences and you're gathering up data points that will eventually lead you back to yourself
[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, but I would say, and are you trying not to go in the dating pool, you know, when you're unhappy, and instead you really want to make this happiness thing priority, almost a career, not like something to get paid for, but meaning it's what you want it to be the most important thing in your life, because the only reason you want to date is because you want to feel better for having gain and for having been in relationship and for having
[SPEAKER_02]: a partner.
[SPEAKER_02]: You're ultimately after happiness.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like no matter what you want to accomplish a choir achieve, you only want it because you think you'll feel better at better fillings what we call happiness.
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's never just grounding it through all these different people and places and things.
[SPEAKER_02]: just try to learn to go directly to the source for it.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then I promise, if you can do this one thing, which feels so hard to be getting, it will make everything else easily and everything else will become easier.
[SPEAKER_02]: Getting more come easier and making money will become easier and saving money will become easier and saving health will become easier.
[SPEAKER_02]: It all becomes easier.
[SPEAKER_02]: If you tackle the real thing you're after and the real thing you want first, but most of us don't do that with the carp or for the horse and then we're like, you know, 110 years old and we're like, oh, I don't even have to do my life happily.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yep, so well said.
[SPEAKER_03]: What I thought of thinking of like, baby times when I wasn't as happy and like attracted certain things, I'm thinking of like, kind of the up and down relations.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_03]: The ones that have extreme highs, and extreme lows.
[SPEAKER_03]: Maybe the ones that you break up and you go back together and you break up.
[SPEAKER_03]: That that shit storm.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_03]: No, we all have.
[SPEAKER_03]: Can, like, do you think that is a form of happiness when you're at the extreme high or is that just inevitably set up for?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that's unhappy.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's not necessarily not a great sign.
[SPEAKER_02]: emotionally regularly themselves, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: And so they don't have self-smooth.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so what that means is that it's like this ping-bong ball effect.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so when you're excited and I'm excited now, when you're sad, I'm sad and it just kind of goes 55,000 different directions.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we say that, you know, that feels a little bit emotionally disordered to me.
[SPEAKER_02]: And that doesn't mean that your relationship shouldn't not have lots of highs.
[SPEAKER_02]: Generally speaking, I'd say that, you know, that's almost always a sign that things are a little less peaceful than you might want.
[SPEAKER_04]: What about a less extreme version of that?
[SPEAKER_04]: Let's pair it down to, let's say early stages of dating.
[SPEAKER_04]: You meet someone, think it's going pretty well.
[SPEAKER_04]: You're not getting the butterflies.
[SPEAKER_04]: We hear this a lot in our group.
[SPEAKER_04]: I don't feel butterflies around this person.
[SPEAKER_04]: I'm not super excited like I was with a previous person.
[SPEAKER_04]: In your personal opinion, which one should we go after?
[SPEAKER_04]: The one that feels steady and calm or the one that gives you butterflies?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so I will say that in such a great question and I cannot even pretend to have any answer on that.
[SPEAKER_02]: I would say, I would say, I love the idea of both.
[SPEAKER_02]: I love the idea of feeling the butterflies, but still feeling really safe in the presence of someone else.
[SPEAKER_02]: Where you know, yeah, where you're a self-esteem and all that doesn't feel like it's at stake all the time.
[SPEAKER_02]: And your will be, is it like it's at stake?
[SPEAKER_02]: And the person doesn't make you feel like they're going to just walk away at any point in time or whatever you know.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's more of a problem.
[SPEAKER_02]: committed there in terms of like caring about your psychological and emotional and spiritual well-being, kind of thing, right, and that can feel like peace, and it just could fill out the butterflies because you're excited to see them.
[SPEAKER_02]: But it's somewhat often butterflies, you know, part of it can be attracted to subtraction, in part of it can be chemistry, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: It's one of those that does
[SPEAKER_02]: like it hasn't anything to do with attraction.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like, why don't chemistry with this person?
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't necessarily find them so attractive or vice versa.
[SPEAKER_02]: I find them so attractive, there's no chemistry there.
[SPEAKER_02]: But there's a third piece of this, which is a little bit more against concerning, which is like familiarity.
[SPEAKER_02]: So sometimes the reason we feel the things we feel is because they consciously or subconsciously remind us of our parents, particularly when we had challenges with or a particular kind of challenge with.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so sometimes we mistake feeling butterflies for
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, and so much of what happens in relationships is that without knowing it, it's like we're trying to heal things that happen in our childhood with our parents.
[SPEAKER_04]: I know.
[SPEAKER_02]: Right.
[SPEAKER_02]: I know.
[SPEAKER_02]: So sometimes the very person that you've been with, yes, is at least the last person should be with.
[SPEAKER_04]: Rob, I heard this theory that the people who give you butterflies resemble your parents the most.
[SPEAKER_04]: That is the most sick, sick theory I've ever heard.
[SPEAKER_04]: But I believe it.
[SPEAKER_04]: I think it's true.
[SPEAKER_04]: It stems from that familiarity.
[SPEAKER_04]: It's pretty fucked up.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, you know, it is, you know, it's very Freudian and now we're talking about that doesn't have to be everyone and I would say that the more work you've done to heal whatever I'm healed stuff you've experienced the past, like the more work you've done, the more confident you can be that when you feel the butterflies, it's not about that, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: That's the question.
[SPEAKER_02]: If you haven't done any work at all, then yeah, probably really strong sign that there's some, you know, associations here with your parents and you probably need to look into that a little bit.
[SPEAKER_02]: Doesn't mean you can't enjoy it, but generally those things don't always go perfectly well.
[SPEAKER_03]: So I love this, like, let's not chase things that make us unhappy, but what about those times that inevitably do?
[SPEAKER_03]: Let's say you break up with a partner or you are really excited about someone that they goes to do.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's almost natural to feel unhappy.
[SPEAKER_03]: Are there ways that you can kind of get out of that and start to get happy again?
[SPEAKER_03]: Like, what are some tactics for those situations?
[SPEAKER_02]: Absolutely.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: So, first part is to accepting knowledge that you feel and to feel what you feel all the way through.
[SPEAKER_02]: So, lots of us try to run from what we're feeling or deny what we're feeling and that doesn't work.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like, cancer that just, you know, sort of continues to grow and under your nose.
[SPEAKER_02]: So instead, you want to feel your feeling.
[SPEAKER_02]: You're feeling grief for
[SPEAKER_02]: you're mourning or you're sad or you're feeling it's hard to just notice what you're feeling but instead of feeding what you're feeling with thoughts and with rumination, self-rimonation particularly is what we're just what most of us do.
[SPEAKER_02]: We think that we're processing but we're mostly just self-ruminating or we think we're talking about it but we're just really self-ruminating and that self-rimonation and that sort of discursive thought is just feeding and feeling the very pain that you're experiencing and so it lasts longer than it normally would and so instead of going to the brain you want to go to the body
[SPEAKER_02]: Where do I feel this sadness, this anxiety, this overwhelmed, this disappointment, this loneliness?
[SPEAKER_02]: Where do I feel in my body and then feel in that place in your body, okay?
[SPEAKER_02]: And then when it thought occurs, or surfaces, you notice the thought without judgment, then just let it go, you come back to the body.
[SPEAKER_02]: And if you want, you can make, this is why meditation doesn't have to call meditation.
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't like using that word too often, people get like, you know, scared away, but the idea essentially is just noticing what you feel and what you think, without feeding it, without judging it and just being with it.
[SPEAKER_02]: Right?
[SPEAKER_02]: And that doesn't mean you can also swiffer.
[SPEAKER_02]: You can also do your work.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: Right?
[SPEAKER_02]: It does mean that you have to totally stop living, but it just means, you know, spend a little time noticing what you're feeling and allowing yourself to feel what you feel.
[SPEAKER_02]: I promise if you don't feed it, I continue to think about it, or reliving it, or pre-living it, which is what someone you have to do.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like this thing happened, and now I'm going to relive it over and over and over and re-traumatize myself a thousand times, or I'm going to pre-live it.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to pre-traumatize myself a thousand more times because I'm afraid of having a future.
[SPEAKER_02]: If you don't do that, you'd be surprised at how quickly it was negative, unhealthy, unhappy, sort of thoughts and emotions start leaving you alone.
[SPEAKER_04]: Mm, that's great.
[SPEAKER_04]: That's a really great tip and I was going to ask you for another tip.
[SPEAKER_04]: If we're doing like a quick start guide to reconnecting to your happiness, what is something that our listeners can do today?
[SPEAKER_04]: Something simple to start opening that door.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so I would say I'm going to give you like four or five real quick I'll be.
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, great.
[SPEAKER_02]: You've been better.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I'm saying.
[SPEAKER_02]: Bonus.
[SPEAKER_02]: Awesome.
[SPEAKER_02]: Number one is those happiness items.
[SPEAKER_02]: Just create a list.
[SPEAKER_02]: Try to do more of those things.
[SPEAKER_02]: Schedule more of those happiness items into your life.
[SPEAKER_02]: There's a thing in the book that places activities that have lived inspire, energize you.
[SPEAKER_02]: or two, happen as deserts.
[SPEAKER_02]: Identify those people places activities and things that train you, do everything you can to get those off your plate.
[SPEAKER_02]: That means outsource them, delegate, reduce them, eliminate, automate, or regulate them.
[SPEAKER_02]: In other words, find a way to get them off your plate if you can.
[SPEAKER_02]: Next thing is, really looking to your life and this is kind of part of the first activity.
[SPEAKER_02]: Be clear, those people who train you, you want to do what you can to spend less time with them or at least shorter periods of time.
[SPEAKER_02]: Maybe see them more frequently,
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, shorter conversation, shorter interactions, you know, keep it short, short, so we can spend more time with the people that uplift you, inspire you, support you, encourage you.
[SPEAKER_02]: Next thing is, start telling better feeling stories about everything in everybody in your life, starting with yourself, no matter what, right, better feeling but truthful stories.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we talked about a little bit like it, you know, here's your dollars, you're not broke.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's the only up from here, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: That's the idea.
[SPEAKER_02]: Next, I would say is, in particular, if you start with self love, one of the best things you can
[SPEAKER_02]: out two or three things or more that you genuinely like and appreciate about yourself can be anything just has to be truthful and try to do that every day.
[SPEAKER_02]: The other thing I'll mention in terms of like the no-thought things I think that's where people get sort of stacked the most is what I call micromanetations.
[SPEAKER_02]: So micromanetation is just one breath.
[SPEAKER_02]: So, I don't know if you've ever been to a meditation class, but it can feel torturous and if you're annoying, like, you know, if you've heard down it, it's like the last thing you want to do.
[SPEAKER_02]: But I'm recommendation is one breath.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I discovered I could always do one breath.
[SPEAKER_02]: And in the one breath, all you're doing is you're pretending, like this moment.
[SPEAKER_02]: No matter where you are or what you're doing or who you're with, is the last moment you have on the planet in your life forever.
[SPEAKER_02]: So, really be sincere about that.
[SPEAKER_02]: This could be the last moment I have.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so, I'm going to milk or juice,
[SPEAKER_02]: is one breath for as much joy as I can possibly get out of it, so I'm going to let all my thoughts go, I'm going to breathe from the stomach, through the nose, from the stomach, and all my thoughts go, and just try to enjoy it that never enjoyed a breath before.
[SPEAKER_02]: Right, so you want to do that is off you remember throughout the day, no matter what else you're doing.
[SPEAKER_02]: That one activity exercise, my communication, it's probably been more helpful to me than almost anything else I've done when I think it's just doing.
[SPEAKER_04]: Oh, wow.
[SPEAKER_04]: That's so powerful.
[SPEAKER_04]: I just did it.
[SPEAKER_04]: I love breath work, but I love the context you put around.
[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, like it's your last breath on earth.
[SPEAKER_04]: So you better fucking do it right.
[SPEAKER_03]: Okay, well, this is a great segue.
[SPEAKER_03]: It just take ways out.
[SPEAKER_03]: There's.
[SPEAKER_03]: so many things to unpack here.
[SPEAKER_03]: I think I mean the first one I think we've come to the consensus that romantic relationships are not the key to happiness.
[SPEAKER_03]: It is from within that being said though I think human connection is essential in life.
[SPEAKER_03]: I think humans are meant to connect with other people and I think loneliness can be a major reason for unhappiness.
[SPEAKER_03]: So, while I think the emphasis might not always have to be on romantic relationships, having relationships in your life is still very, very important.
[SPEAKER_03]: And that is a way that you can, you know, connect with others, but it should never be at the detriment of connecting with yourself.
[SPEAKER_00]: Mm-hmm.
[SPEAKER_00]: Love that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Beautiful.
[SPEAKER_03]: I think my other takeaway is this better feeling story.
[SPEAKER_03]: I love that.
[SPEAKER_03]: We always say positive mindset shift and I like that too, but I feel like sometimes I feel a little intimidating and I think at the crux event.
[SPEAKER_03]: We're saying the same thing is this better feeling story.
[SPEAKER_03]: How can I spin it that I see the good in the situation?
[SPEAKER_03]: So I think rewiring it from that and I think that that terminology, I love it so much because like you said, it's it's true.
[SPEAKER_03]: And when you believe it, then you'll start to see it's true.
[SPEAKER_03]: But it is true.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's not like a falsism.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's just choosing to find the more positive part of what's going about in your life.
[SPEAKER_03]: Oh, that's so good.
[SPEAKER_04]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_04]: It's so magical to think about this because it's very similar to my takeaway
[SPEAKER_04]: illusion to reality.
[SPEAKER_04]: And you said this earlier, Rob, is what could be seem like an illusion if you believe it, it is your reality.
[SPEAKER_04]: And I think telling yourself these better stories about your life, your own self-love will
[SPEAKER_04]: turn that illusion into a reality.
[SPEAKER_04]: I really believe that happiness is our default setting, and nobody can take away from us only yourself.
[SPEAKER_04]: So I think we need to have a little accountability with our own happiness that nobody else is causing or happiness or unhappiness except for yourself.
[SPEAKER_04]: And because of that, we just got to scratch a little bit more to find that happiness, but it's there.
[SPEAKER_04]: It's like the first layer of our skin or whatever, whatever they call it in those skincare
[SPEAKER_04]: It's like, describe to surface and it's there.
[SPEAKER_04]: You've always had it, instead of delaying it into the future that you talked about earlier, it's don't postpone happiness.
[SPEAKER_04]: Don't give your future self so much pressure to make your current self happy because that's not going to happen.
[SPEAKER_04]: It is forever accessible to you and tap into it whenever you want to.
[SPEAKER_04]: And there are some great tactics that Rob just told us about to tap into the happiness.
[SPEAKER_02]: You two are good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, you're not going to learn it a lot.
[SPEAKER_02]: So to love, you know, you can love the cashier, you know, you can love the person in the middle of the year.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know what I mean?
[SPEAKER_02]: You can love the kitten, you can love the tree, like you can love the sunset, like just, you know, love, don't wait to love, don't procrastinate, don't hesitate, you know, don't postpone, like love now, live now, enjoy now.
[SPEAKER_03]: I love that so much and we always say that to people that are, you know, searching for love.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's you have love.
[SPEAKER_03]: You've been in relationships before.
[SPEAKER_03]: Even if you haven't been in a ton of romantic relationships, you have a family.
[SPEAKER_03]: You have friends.
[SPEAKER_03]: Those are all relationships.
[SPEAKER_03]: So everyone is capable of loving relationships, whether you're in a relationship, our romantic relationship or not.
[SPEAKER_02]: So good.
[SPEAKER_02]: I love that beautifully said.
[SPEAKER_04]: thousand percent.
[SPEAKER_04]: I'm going to go and make my happiness island and happy.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yes, desert to the right now.
[SPEAKER_03]: I love it.
[SPEAKER_04]: I'm going to do that with my partner and see me have any overlapping islands and deserts.
[SPEAKER_04]: And then we're going to get to action on how to deal with all of that and create more happiness for ourselves.
[SPEAKER_04]: Thank you so much Rob for being on our show.
[SPEAKER_04]: If people want to get to know you a little better and learn
[SPEAKER_02]: For sure, you can find happiness from the inside out and love from the inside out soon at Barnes & Noble and Amazon, anywhere else, great bookshores sold.
[SPEAKER_02]: You can find me at my website at CodeProbMacovacyk.com and you can also find me on most also Shemina platforms, probably most consistently Instagram at RobMacovacyk official.
[SPEAKER_03]: Awesome, when does your next book come out?
[SPEAKER_02]: It's gonna come out the end of this year.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's okay.
[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, the end of this year's announcement should be December.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_03]: Awesome.
[SPEAKER_04]: Very exciting.
[SPEAKER_04]: Well, definitely promote it to our community as well.
[SPEAKER_04]: I'm sure they want to read that.
[SPEAKER_02]: So appreciate you all.
[SPEAKER_02]: Truly appreciate.
[SPEAKER_04]: And if you haven't done so yet, subscribe to the psychology of relationships today.
[SPEAKER_04]: So you don't miss an episode.
[SPEAKER_04]: And we'll see you all next week.
[SPEAKER_04]: Bye.