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13th June 2010

The 7 Habits of Highly Unhappy People!

Its only when we realise and acknowledge that we are each 100% responsible for ourhappiness that we start to notice the things that we do that creates our unhappiness.Only when we fully accept responsibility for our own happiness will we start to eliminatethe habits that sabotage our contentment and joy. They are habits that many of us havelearned to justify (a habit in itself!) as we often dont want to see and accept that they arethe cause of our unhappiness. They are also habits that we sometimes want to see asnatural as they seem to form the very fabric of our day-to-day relationships. They arethe 7 habits of highly unhappy people.

JudgingHave you noticed when you judge another you lose your inner peace? And inner peaceis the primary ingredient of authentic happiness. Not only do we learn to judge but closeon the mental heals of our judgements often comes the sentence and the punishment!All together (judgment, sentence and punishment) they make up the package calledcondemnation which is guaranteed happiness killer!

CriticisingWhen we criticise it means we are attacking and somewhere in there is usually angeralbeit in a milder form. And when you are angry you cannot be happy. Yes some of us

do attempt to justify our attack by calling it constructive criticism but if there is any angerpresent its more often revenge or punishment in disguise! Definitely not a happy habitbut a common one all the same.

ComplainingIt seems to be endemic in some cultures to complain. Complaining signals the presenceof upsetness and therefore the absence of happiness. Whereas in giving feedback andmaking a request ensures there is no discontentment. Easy theory, but hard topractice, especially if we have been playing that old complaining record all our life.

BlamingProjecting blame onto someone else is not only a happiness killer but usually a strategyto avoid responsibility. Its driven by the perfect combination of anger and fear and istherefore a painful cry that sounds like, Its all your fault, but which, when decoded,

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really means, I have just made my self very unhappy!

ArguingTrying to prove we are right, or attempting to make the other as right as us, is usuallyboth a tense and grumpy affair. Neither side is happy in the process, and even if itseems one side has won, any happiness is short lived until the next opportunity to beright is craved for and invoked! To argue is to tell the world that we prefer misery to

merriment!

CompetingIts not so easy to see why the habit of competing is an unhappy pastime. Most of ushave assimilated the belief that competition is good, fun and even joyful.But all we have to do is glance at the faces of long distance runners, tennis players andeven snooker players and we will see 99% of the game is played in a state of abjectsuffering. Occasionally, in the middle of the game or the match, someone will let a littlejoy slip out, but it doesnt last long. All competition contains fear by definition, whichalong with anger, are the sworn enemies of happiness.

ControllingAttempting to make others dance to our tune is always an impossible task. Expectingthe world to be and do as we would wish is an expectation too far. Both aredemonstrations that we still believe others are responsible for our happiness. It is a beliefby which the world runs. If the truth were realise and lived i.e. that we are eachresponsible for our own happiness, the world would be a very different planet on which tolive. One day perhaps!

So there you have it. Only seven of many habits that we activate sometimes severaltimes a day. In so doing we block the light of the sun of happiness from shinning throughour life. Each habit is embedded in a culture in which it has become socially acceptable

to think and act in such ways. And so it is that we unknowingly collude with each otherto sustain our unhappiness. And as we do we gift the 7 habits of highly unhappy peopleto the next generation!

Question: Which of the above do you find yourself doing most frequently (rate each ona scale of 1 Low to 5 high)

Reflection: Why do you think we all learn to sustain our own unhappiness and notrealise that we do so?

Action: Take ten minutes and decide what would be the positive equivalent of each ofthe above