How to use the exact right amount of effort all the time.
Category: Happiness
Why You’re So Confused About What You Want
There’s lots of advice out there on how to achieve your dreams.
But what if I don’t know what my dream even is?! How on earth do I move on when I have difficulty realising what I even want?
Some Reminders About Your Value
It’s surprisingly easy to forget these things about ourselves:
Doing Things is Overrated… So Stop (A Bit)
You know that bit in the Simpsons intro where Maggie is steering on a pretend wheel to mimic the driving that Marge is doing? Our brains would genuinely be happier if we could attach a fake steering wheel to “life” and pretend we were controlling everything that happens to us.
Why Am I Always Repeating the Same Problems Over and Over?
It often feels like I keep running into the same problems again and again.
The Gap Between Where We Are and What We Want
It seems fairly clear to me is that there’s often a gap between “what we have” and “what we want”. If I were to accurately model this gap using Science(TM) and Art(TM) it’d look something like this:
The One Answer to All Our Problems
I want the answer. The one, single answer which will solve all my problems.
Oh no, I’m Motivated By Fear!
Now that I’m (mostly) successfully managing my anxiety, everything should be great forever… right?! Well, no. Obviously life isn’t magically perfect. (Though of course “less anxiety” is a huge improvement!) This is fine. I never expected perfection. But something else I didn’t expect was that managing anxiety better could itself cause problems.
My Life Is Not Worth Living
I sometimes felt like my life isn’t worth living.
Enjoying The Bad Days Too
For most of us, learning to be happy after anxiety isn’t a smooth journey. If you pushed me into saying more, I’d go as far as saying it’s a bumpy journey. In fact, I’d probably get over-excited and go super-metaphorical about it: