4154: Mindful Happiness by Ira Israel on Personal Fulfillment

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[00:01:00] [SPEAKER_00] This is Optimal Living Daily. Mindful Happiness by Ira Israel of IraIsrael.com And your narrator Justin Malik reading you blogs every single day of the year, including holidays. So that was to get right to it as we optimize your life. Mindful Happiness by Ira Israel of IraIsrael.com Quote, Happiness cannot be pursued.

[00:01:28] [SPEAKER_00] You do not find happiness. Happiness finds you. It is not an end in itself, but a byproduct of other activities, often arriving when it is least expected. Mick Brown Quote, It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society. Krishnamurti

[00:01:48] [SPEAKER_00] I spent the last 15 years reading every self-help, spirituality made simple, happiness for dummies, mindfulness, yoga, DIY, psychotherapy book known to God and man. To reduce thousands of years of religion, psychology, and philosophy to a 1000 word blog would be unwise, if not vulgar. And yet once you parse the semantic differences between the sundry religions, psychologies, and philosophies,

[00:02:14] [SPEAKER_00] and the plethora of derivative transformational workshops, like the ones I teach, and therapeutic modalities, like the ones I use with patients, it is easy to see how many of the problems we encounter are culturally contingent, and how many of the proposed solutions are tantamount to serving old wine and new bottles. Here's what I have learned, what I teach, and what I live. Number 10. Pursuing happiness actually causes misery.

[00:02:40] [SPEAKER_00] The irony is that if you want to be happy, you need to release your desire to be happy. For desire is the root of all suffering, according to the Buddha, and happiness, when it occurs, is actually a byproduct and not a direct result of particular actions. The best way to engender and maximize the byproduct of happiness is to embrace a lifestyle and incorporate tools that are scientifically proven to keep you at the high end of your happiness spectrum,

[00:03:06] [SPEAKER_00] such as meditation, yoga, exercise, ample sleep, community, self-discipline, secure attachments, intimacy, authentic communications, delayed gratification, and eating to fuel your body instead of eating for self-destructive psychological and emotional reasons. If you live in America, then you have been raised to believe that the pursuit of happiness is an inalienable right, which was grand and appetizing for the oppressed pilgrims who settled these fine shores many moons ago.

[00:03:36] [SPEAKER_00] However, we know now that pursuing happiness causes misery because your mind is akin to an hedonic treadmill. As soon as a desire is sated, it is replaced by another desire. If you think you'll be happy when you get a new car, house, partner, or job, scientific studies inform us that those shiny new objects lose their allure in 12 to 18 months. Number 9. Release Expectations. The future is a void.

[00:04:02] [SPEAKER_00] One of the primary features of our minds is to imagine potential future scenarios in an attempt to stave off possible traumatic surprises. This defense mechanism, which was so essential to help you survive your highly competitive and often disappointing childhood, is now hindering you from showing up authentically in the relationships that are integral to your healing journey. Thus, learn how to observe your mind's incessant leaping into possible future scenarios and gently correct it by teaching it to be here now.

[00:04:33] [SPEAKER_00] Number 8. Your mind was trained to want more, better, different. If you want to be happy, you need to untrain it and replace those woulda, coulda, shouldas with gratitude and acceptance. Number 7. Your mind is plagued by the irrational thought, something is wrong, I'm different from other people, I don't feel safe. Everyone has experienced traumas and our minds have clung to those past events and kept them alive as if they were still happening.

[00:05:00] [SPEAKER_00] Forgiveness and acceptance are tools that we must continuously employ in order to release or at least reframe past traumas. Number 6. Your mind is plagued by the irrational thought, something must be wrong with me. Children assimilate negative energy around them by having the voices in their heads say, there must be something wrong with me. If I had been different, then mommy and daddy wouldn't have gotten divorced. My brother wouldn't have died. My best friend wouldn't have moved away. Fill in the blank happened.

[00:05:30] [SPEAKER_00] It's just as easy for their narrative to be, my life is perfect. It's not my fault that my parents got divorced, my brother died, my best friend moved away, fill in the blank happened. Reframe your narrative in order to eliminate the resentments that your mind creates. Resentment equals this should not have happened. Number 5. You have an internal barometer that was shaped before you could speak that either informs you that the world is an inherently scary place with finite resources or a loving place of abundance.

[00:06:00] [SPEAKER_00] Your way of being in the world, your core issues and your disposition are not as dynamic as you've been informed to believe. The current wave of neuroplasticity sweeping self-help books is belied by false syllogisms such as, brain cells are malleable. Meditation relaxes people. Thus, meditation changes brain cells. This is inaccurate and misleading. Tools such as meditation were not and cannot be designed to change particular brain cells.

[00:06:28] [SPEAKER_00] Specifically, meditation was designed to alleviate suffering by learning to transcend or tame the restless mind. Why is the mind restless? Because, number 8 from earlier, your society has trained you to think more, better, different will make you happier. Number 7 earlier, that you are not safe and must keep your guard up and adrenaline pumping or you'll get hurt. And, number 6 from earlier, there must be something wrong with you. However, it is equally possible to train your mind to believe that you are not presently in danger,

[00:06:57] [SPEAKER_00] there's nothing wrong with you, and your life is unfolding exactly as it should be unfolding. So, don't worry about your prefrontal cortex or synapses or neurons or limbic system or anything that you cannot directly experience through your five senses. Worry about showing up and being present for your life. Number 4, self-discipline equals self-worth. We have an epidemic of people in our culture who suffer from low self-worth,

[00:07:25] [SPEAKER_00] low self-esteem, and negative self-talk that manifest as alcoholism, infidelity, gambling addictions, shopping addictions, eating disorders, and a host of other afflictions. Whenever patients think that their accomplishments are not good enough, I ask, Whose voice is that? Usually it is a teacher's or parent's or sibling's voice. No bonobo ever thought, Yes, I'm enjoying this delicious fruit right now, but I'll only be truly happy when I have an entire plantation.

[00:07:52] [SPEAKER_00] If you suffer from low self-worth and want to correct this, then cultivate personal discipline. Make commitments such as eliminating high fructose corn syrup and sugar from your diet, meditating every day for a month, going someplace you've never been once a week, etc., and stick to those commitments. I've noticed in my psychotherapy practice that people with low self-worth have problems with self-discipline and vice versa. One way to raise self-worth is to be sufficiently disciplined to have daily practices

[00:08:21] [SPEAKER_00] that you can be proud of accomplishing. Number three, realize that most of the things you learn through popular culture, acquiring money, power, material possessions, bling, do not correlate strongly with happiness. We all know a lot of people who have more money than God and are still miserable. Ironically, it turns out that givers are happier than takers in the long run. Being generous and helping others is infinitely more satisfying than looking at your bank account statements.

[00:08:51] [SPEAKER_00] Only an idiot wants the richest guy in the cemetery on his tombstone. The only thing that correlates strongly with authentic happiness is trustworthy, positive, loving relationships. Being giving and generous helps build those relationships. Number two, authenticity. You created a false self, a facade, a persona to survive your childhood, and the defense mechanisms you developed became your way of being, your personality.

[00:09:19] [SPEAKER_00] There's a good chance that your facade or personality is quite functional and even seductive. However, you know that underneath it lies an authentic self that is rather messy and unseemly. Relationships based on facades crumble. So you must be brave enough to be vulnerable, show your authentic self, and express yourself authentically and compassionately in order to cultivate vibrant, positive, loving relationships. Number one,

[00:09:46] [SPEAKER_00] this moment is everything that you will ever have. If you say, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'll do these things, meditate, exercise, eat healthily, speak authentically, explore new places, because tomorrow, studies show that you will never do them. Happiness is a choice, and it is up to you to embrace a lifestyle and incorporate tools that will keep you at the top of your happiness range today. You just listened to the post titled,

[00:10:16] [SPEAKER_00] Mindful Happiness, by Ira Israel of iraisrael.com. And I'll be right back with my commentary. Now I want to tell you about a book that stuck with me, Life at the Speed of Play, Launch Products People Love, by Mark Pincus. Mark's a legendary Silicon Valley entrepreneur and one of the most prolific idea generators around. But as he'll tell you, ideas are a dime a dozen. What matters is picking the right ones. His instant national bestseller is a fast-paced,

[00:10:46] [SPEAKER_00] 170-page read for these uncertain times full of real-life skills in a battle-tested, easy-to-follow framework for separating the great ideas from the terrible ones. Y Combinator's Gary Tan says it'll change your odds of success. And it reads less like a stuffy business book, more like you're in Mark's kitchen already in his inner circle. Go to GetMarksBook.com slash old and buy one copy, and Mark personally,

[00:11:15] [SPEAKER_00] not his publisher, sends you a second one free. Two books, about $16 each, so you can hand one to a friend who's stuck. Once again, that's GetMarksBook.com slash old.

[00:11:49] [SPEAKER_03] Always wear your seatbelt.

[00:11:52] [SPEAKER_04] Star Wars, The Mandalorian and Grogu. Now streaming on Disney+. Read PG-13.

[00:12:00] [SPEAKER_00] Take it, Ira. It's funny, in the beginning, Ira was talking about how he spent the last 15 years reading every self-help, mindfulness, and DIY psychotherapy book ever. Sometimes that's what I feel like I'm doing as well. It's hard to argue with most of what he's saying here. Much of what we talk about does boil down to some of these ideas. Somewhat recently, we heard on this show from another author about the idea that actually trying to pursue happiness

[00:12:30] [SPEAKER_00] can make things worse, and that focusing on things beyond ourselves, like on other people's happiness, and getting out of our own heads, could actually have the sort of unintended consequence of bringing more happiness into our own lives. Lots of things to think about from this article, so thank you to Ira. He clearly has read a lot about this stuff, but I should do it for today. Thank you for being here, and I'll catch you tomorrow where your optimal life awaits.