How to be Happy

Everyone desires happiness. On theory, it's so easy to achieve it and yet millions upon millions suffer everyday, despite not having that much tragedy in their life. So here's how you can live a happy life, and this article wont have those generic self-help type of advice. 

1) Problem is what makes you happy 

One wise woman told me: "Happiness comes from solving problems" and I couldn't have agreed more. This sentence has 2 focal points: you need to solve problems and you need to have problem to solve. There's a subtle difference there which I will go over in another paragraph. For now, let's go back to the quote.  

Almost every movies that ever produced have the same story-telling formula: a character is living in their flaws yet comfort zone -> said character is forced to step out of their comfort zone to solve a problem -> said character, now with less flaws, returns to the comfort zone after solving the problem.

The problem solving is always the whole point of the movies. Seeing the main characters overcoming obstacles give the audiences that feel good moment. So the next time you encounter a problem, don't run away or sideline it. Deal with every problems that come your way. You always learn something new in the end so there's no such thing as waste of time. The feeling of achievement, the new lesson and a whole new story to share with your closed ones are all of the things that make you happy. Solve 1 problem, gets 3 rewards, minimum. 

A trophy isn't just for boasting with your colleagues, a trophy is a reminder of your journey to success.

An extra tip from script writing: you always solve the internal problem before the presented problem. In movies, the main character needs to learn about themselves before the big victory. Iron man and Thor both learns the lesson of being humble before pummeling their enemies. Lance Sterling needs to understand the values of the super nerd teammate to stop Killian's evil plan (Spy in Disguise). Every horror movies main characters need to keep their fear in check to face the supernatural forces. And every romantic comedies have the couple realize that they're part of the problem before fixing themselves, and after that, the relationship. So if you meet some sort of an impossible task that you are 100% sure can't be fixed, maybe you need to fix a hidden problem within yourself first. If you want to understand more about yourself but couldn't, you can wait for my blog about understanding yourself. 

2) The "Let's avoid this problem" mentality 

The first unhappy group of people tends to have this mentality. They either run away from the problem, refuse to see it as a problem or just blame it on other uncontrollable factors and move on with life. They also spend a worry amount of time thinking/planning to minimize the chance of problems occur 

Denial is one of the most common defense mechanic of humanity. For a short explanation: defense mechanics are things that human uses on instinct to keep themselves at a happy state. Since it's an instinct, rarely do people know they are actually using it. Have you ever meet someone who's always happy? But then you get to know them and they are the most over thinker ever? Chances are they use denial in their everyday life. Alcohol or gaming addiction are also sight of a defense mechanic abuser. The problem with defense mechanic is that they store all of those negatives feeling in the back of your mind. To quote my favorite example from Anger Management: There are 2 kinds of angry: the customers who scream at cashier for stupidly small problems and the cashier who has to smile through those pain, days in days out when they finally decided to shoot up the whole cafe. The next time you lash out on someone, dig real deeps within yourself and locate exactly where that anger comes from. Most of the time you may find a lot of problems bury deep below. If that's the case, let's start working to solve those problems. 

Everyone has a storage with all of their insecurities, fears and other stuffs. The earlier you accept this place exist, the earlier you can start to learn dealing with it, the happier you will be.

"But if it's my instinct, how do I know when I'm upset". That's a problem for another day, in another article maybe. 

3) The "I have no problem" mentality 

Imagine a person who works at a very stable job, just go home and watch movies or spend time for a few specific hobbies that they have been doing for years. If that sounds like happiness to you, congrats, you found your way of life. For those who is living this type of life and feeling empty, well, that's the problem. You are probably a thinker: aka people who think and don't act. What prevent you from acting might be burns out, lack of motivation or different types of fear. If it's burn out, you just need a bit of rest, no big deal. If it is motivation, then you can check out the very first article of my blog. 

Fear, unfortunately, is much more complex. Fear of failure and rejection are among the most popular ones. This might comes from your lack of self-confidence due to past events. But if you don't take action because of fear of failure, you will never achieve anything special, which means you have no basis to be confident about. Having no achievement also means you are pron to envy with other successful people or people who have the balls to try things that you can't. Being envy is also a source of unhappiness. It's a vicious cycle of death that will keep getting worse if you don't do something about it. Stop thinking and just step out of your comfort zone. Pick a random thing that you want to try. Hell, pick something just because it's new. New things are automatically create a challenge that you have to overcome. Of course I'm not advocating you to try drugs or bang bimbos and get STDs. Be cautious but don't be uptight. Be experimental, be open-minded, be ready for challenges. Be anything but boring.  

Unlike cats who can peacefully sleep all day, human's destiny is to fight in a never ending war against their own boredom.

TLDR: here are some tips to be happy: 

1/ Be courageous and deal with every problem that come your way.

2/ When you feel empty or negative emotions such as sadness, envy, anger... look within yourself and identify the true cause that might be hidden. 

3/ Try new things. 

Yeah, so that's how to be happy, at least according to me. What do you think? Have you ever been in these state of mind? Have you use these tips before or see anyone recommending these tips? Do you have your own trick to stay happy? Do you want to know more about defense mechanics and how to overcome them? Leave me a message, let's discuss. I'm always happy to learn more. 

Quanny Nguyen