Let's Find Happiness
☆ Martin Seville
??Personal Development Specialist?? Working with Leaders, Managers, Business Owners and Teams to overcome what's in their way and build the life they want.
Welcome to the ninth edition of the Your Extraordinary Life Newsletter.
THANK YOU, as always, for subscribing and being part of this journey together. What a great community of over 1,000 like-minded people we're building, all of whom want to live their most Extraordinary Life! Let's keep our community growing.
As a recap, this newsletter is designed to help You navigate the thrills and spills of professional and personal life. In each issue you'll get:
Motivation Time
Happiness is the theme for this edition. The question is how Happy are you? Is your Happiness fleeting? Can you find Happiness during tough times? Do you know the 3 types of Happiness and how to integrate them into your life? What really gets in the way of your Happiness? Could you believe that Happiness is a choice and it's all about what you focus on and the meaning you give it?
Well, what my mentor Tony Robbins taught me about Happiness changed my life, and in this short video he'll share some of these concepts around Happiness with you. He'll also answer all the questions above.
So, get inspired and motivated by this ... but, more importantly, use it to rediscover your Happiness.
Wishing you a lifetime of Happiness, and as Tony says:
"The only way to have our Happiness long term is to have expectations that are authentic."
Extraordinary Life Lesson
How do some people stay positive during tough times? How can life hit someone sideways, yet they dust themselves off and see a positive? How can some people be Happy that they faced insurmountable challenges?
It's all in the meaning they give the situation.
As someone on their 7th chance of life, I have mastered bringing positive meaning to any situation. Last year in the immediate aftermath of a car crash, I lay there with the seat fully reclined from the impact, opened my eyes, looked at the sky and said "Okay universe, what's the lesson you want me to learn from this?" That's literally the first thing I thought. I immediately sought meaning. I could have been angry, furious, upset, worried given another car had ploughed into the back of me at high speed, inconveniently disrupting both of our Easter Days ... but I sought positive meaning. This regulated my emotions, and certainly helped me remain calm and positive for the next 6 hours as I was left on the side of road, with injuries that 19 months later I'm still recovering from.
In my rollercoaster of a life, I'm Happy and Grateful for the things I've experienced - the good and the horrific. They've given me purpose and made me the man I am today.
It's easy to be Happy when things are going well, but what really matters is how Happy can you be during and after the tough times. Master this and the quality of your life will exponentially improve.
The Formula for Happiness
As I've said many times before, Frameworks are priceless. Whether they help you get predictable and sustainable results, or help you reflect, plan and take action.
Today's framework helps you with the action to get the result you want - in this case: Happiness.
Credit where credit's due, it was Tony who taught me what I'll share today, and acts as a perfect framework to compliment the Motivational video above.
So, without further ado, it's my pleasure to introduce you to The Formula for Happiness.
Essentially made up of two elements - Life Conditions and Your Blueprint - what may seem a little odd at first, soon makes perfect sense. Let me explain ...
Life Conditions
This refers to what you're experiencing in life today. It's what's going on, how we're acting, how we're thinking, how others are acting and thinking. Our current life experience.
Your Blueprint
This is how you feel things should be. How you think you should think and act. How you think others should think and act. How a situation should pan out.
Happy v Unhappy
When our Life Conditions match our Blueprint, we're Happy. When they don't, we're Unhappy.
For example, have you ever shared something with someone and naturally expected them to respond in a certain way. Maybe you had a new idea, or bought something, and you're expecting a supportive and encouraging response. But the response you get is less than supportive and encouraging. How did that make you feel? Not Happy!
I find this a lot with clients who have a new vision and passion ... they're pumped, I'm pumped, we know they can do it ... then they share it with a friend or family member and the wind gets knocked out of their sails. The naysayers show up, with their blueprint of the world and what they think you should and shouldn't do. It jolts our Happiness ... and if we're not careful it will stop us in our tracks.
Apply this Formula for Happiness to any area of your life. If you think you should look a certain way, or should have a certain level of fitness, but you don't ... you're unhappy about it. If you think you should have more intimacy in your relationship, but you don't create it ... you're unhappy about it.
The truth is we have a blueprint for everything. The kind of person we should be. The kind of partner we should be. The kind of parent we should be. The kind of friend, son, daughter, brother, sister, leader, manager, business owner we should be. How we think the world should be run. What we deem should be fair. How governments and people in power should behave. How a company should treat us as a loyal customer. The list goes on.
The challenge is we tend to have so many Blueprints and often far too many criteria within them to meet, for us to be Happy. If we're not careful we're constantly feeling let down, or not good enough. Let's be honest we're all Master's at giving ourselves a hard time ... and a lot of that comes back to this formula. We're making it too difficult to feel happy about us and the world around us.
Most people don't see the world like this; so that's the beauty of having this framework. You now have something to refer back to. If you're feeling unhappy about something, ask yourself what the criteria would be for you to feel happy. How many boxes would you have to tick, and is it even reasonable for people to respond or situations to pan out exactly how you'd like?
My Top Tip on this is to reduce the number Blueprints you have, reduce the number of criteria and don't expect things, and especially people, to respond like you think they will. Set yourself up for success. This has the potential to exponentially improve your Happiness.
领英推荐
... and with the festive season just around the corner as I write this, please review your Blueprint for a great Christmas! Reduce the criteria and reduce the expectation ... and you'll discover a far more joyful experience; I certainly did.
A word on Suffering
Before I wrap up the Formula for Happiness, it's worth sharing that Suffering is brought on by not only Your Blueprint not being met, but finger pointing to all the external reasons why this is the case. Your partner, the company, the economy, the government.
You start believing you've got no choice but to be Unhappy because of these factors out of your control. This just isn't true. You always have a choice. It's a tough thing to face, and I've had to face it, but this truth will set you free. We have more control over our life and our Happiness than we ever give ourselves credit. So, don't sit and suffer. Review your Blueprint. Review what's in your control, and take a next step towards your Happiness.
Top Tip: Here's a short video I recorded about The Formula for Happiness. Whilst I initially recorded it for Stressed Dads, it's 100% relevant for everyone. I bring to life everything I've mentioned above.
Enjoy, review your Blueprints and experience the difference in your Happiness.
Recommendations
Book Recommendation
Walking On Sunshine: 52 Small Steps To Happiness, by Rachel Kelly.
Perfect for our theme of Happiness, Rachel has written a lovely and insightful book taken from her diary entries over a year. In it she shares her own tips and ideas on how to stay calm and happy through the seasons, of the year, of life. With 52 real life examples, there's one for every week of the year. If you love real life and simple things you can put into action immediately, like I do, you'll love this. Enjoy, and let me know which of Rachel's 52 ideas you like the most.
... and be mindful of what Rachel says:
"You cannot simply become happy, like flicking a switch in your head. Rather happiness is often an indirect consequence of the way we think and our actions."
Here's Walking On Sunshine, using my Affiliate link. Any affiliate commissions will go towards supporting Gloucestershire Bundles who help families in crisis. I have a particular passion to help families throughout the year, and to ensure each child in these families receives a Christmas present at the end of the year.
Coaching Recommendation
In my corporate career in Financial Services, Christmas after Christmas was compromised because I'd work myself into the ground in the run up to Christmas. It was far from a Happy time.
There can be a lot of pressure and expectation at year-end, although I found I was often the one creating that pressure and expectation, by wanting to get everything done, all at the same time, all by Christmas, as if there was no time after Christmas. The result: I sacrificed my health, my time, my family, my Christmas. Does this sound familiar?
If so, I'm so excited to offer you the opportunity to turn that around and make this Christmas different. It took 27 years, but I've figured out how to reclaim our Christmas; and it's now what my clients and I use, at Christmas, and all year long.
To bring this together in the most accessible way I've created a limited time Group Coaching programme between 26th November and the end of January to give you:
Registration closes at 6pm UK time on 25th November, so be quick as we start on Tuesday 26th November.
A favour I'd ask is, if this isn't for you, have a think whether you have any friends, family or colleagues who might benefit. Share this with them, and let's give them the gift of reclaiming their family Christmas. Thank You.
Community Recommendation
It's our small, global community of like-minded people looking to be better and do better, so we can live our most Extraordinary Lives. With an increasing library of over 80 hours of Exclusive trainings and events, there's plenty of valuable content and resources for everyone ... for Free!
I look forward to welcoming you soon.
Sign off
Thank You, as always, for joining us for this Happiness edition of the Your Extraordinary Life Newsletter!
I truly hope you've found it valuable in looking at your Happiness differently, and seeing just how much control we actually have over it.
I love sharing with you what I've learnt, put into practice and can hand on heart say works. I continue to believe lived experience remains the most powerful gift we can give others, and it's a pleasure and privilege putting this together for you.
I'd love to hear from you. So, drop me a comment or message on what you think, ask any questions you may have, and please do share the newsletter with anyone that might benefit. Lets keep this Extraordinary community growing.
Remember also, if you'd like to go a little deeper into anything we've covered in this, or any, edition, then please do book a free call. It would be a privilege to help you.
Thanks again, and until next time, remember just how Extraordinary you are.
Your coach, mentor and friend,
Martin