“Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.” – Mahatma Gandhi
What creates happiness?
As we said yesterday — nothing, by itself.
Happiness is most often won through many smaller wins:
A series of smart, long-term investments that compound over time to create the lasting emotional wealth we call “happiness.”
Those investments may include…
(in no particular order)
* Building your foundational health
* Living with integrity (good people tend to like who they are more than not-so-good people)
* Healing (resolving past trauma and emotional holding patterns)
* Choosing the right romantic partner
* Social connection and cultivating friendships
* Being good to people (giving, helping, performing random acts of kindness, etc)
* Doing great work that you’re proud of, and has meaning to you
* Gaining essential clarity on your values, purpose, personal philosophy, and greater life vision
* Making progress towards a worthy goal (happiness is determined more by your sense of progression than by your current position)
* Developing skills that are meaningful to you
* Organizing your finances, gaining clarity on your financial position, and being disciplined in how you manage and grow your money
* Sunlight (especially in the morning)
* Cold exposure (shown to increase dopamine 200-500%)
* Simple pleasures in appropriate doses (pleasure is a wonderful supplement but a terrible diet)
* Optimizing your physical appearance without obsessing over it (ie. feeling good about how you look so that you can stop worrying about how you look)
* Pushing into challenges and overcoming them
* Long-term accumulation of life experiences that increase wisdom
* Appreciation of simple, everyday moments.
…Or, to put it more simply:
Living well.
I hope you enjoyed.
– T
P.S. This email marks the end of our series on happiness.
Here’s where you can read (or re-read) the complete series.
And remember:
A (way) juiced-up version of this series will be taught live at our retreat during the first week of August — and the recording of that session will be released in The Path shortly afterwards.
Stay tuned 🙂
