A couple weeks back in psychology class, we learnt about happiness.
Yeah, I know. Seems so stupid (or is it sad?) to have to LEARN about happiness.
We surely all know WHAT it is, right?
Well, maybe not.
You see, theories like the ‘Hedonic Treadmill’, where it is explained that humans, no matter how positive or negative we can be in life, always have the tendency to return to a relative or baseline level of happiness.
So, let’s say you dream of being happy with more money, a perfect relationship, more sex, a better job, a faster car, a cooler looking scoop shirt (are these seriously in these days?), or whatever, it doesn’t matter. Since, the more you accumulate, the more you acquire, the more your expectations and desires tend to grow.
This, leaving you with what you wanted in the first place and your thought of true happiness, now out of your grasp, and essentially, moved up an entire level.
Damn greedy tetrapod’s.
Fortunately for us though, there are methods for getting on top of this constant search for happiness, and it comes in the form of simply improving our overall well-being.
Sounds easy enough, right?
Well, it is. And things like building and nurturing relationships, letting go of anger and resentment towards people (aka forgiveness), practicing acts of kindness, savouring each and every one of life’s joys (past-reminiscence, present-mindfulness and future-optimism), expressing gratitude, and of course, striving to better ourselves, are simple things to add into our lives.
We touched on that a bit last week, but a couple of weekends ago something really woke me up to a few new things on the matter. And if you follow me on Facebook, you most likely would’ve seen what.
Martin Rooney.
You might not have heard of him before, but this man in the middle is seriously a life changer.
Admittedly, I have been stalking him for a good 6 or so years… But hey, it’s harmless. It’s the good kind of stalking after all… (There’s a good kind?)
To give you an idea of the work this guy has done, he has trained high-level athletes from the NFL, NBA and UFC. The contracts alone for the hundreds of professional athletes he has trained are worth at an excess of 1 billion dollars. He has presented in over 25 countries where he has inspired, along with certifying, over 1500 trainers/coaches in his own-personal ‘Training for Warriors’ program.
Pretty legit.
So anyway, he ran a 2-day course that he managed to sell-out completely with over 45 people attending and hanging onto every word that came out of his mouth a couple weekends back.
He also managed to reignite the fire in each of us through educating, entertaining, enthusing, encouraging, enlightening, empowering and even exercising all of us.
Also pretty legit.
It definitely was one of those times in your life that wake you back up to what you’re doing and why in fact, you’re doing it.
Bringing with him all his different philosophies, principles, theories, concepts, and stories to re-confirm what we were already doing, it provided a whole new light and way for us to go about helping people’s lives.
Numero uno.
One particular philosophy that stuck with me after the weekend was his “training is forever” one.
Despite me knowing and preaching this one already, it made me re-think about some of the clients I train, some of my friends, and even family members that don’t always see eye-to-eye when it comes to getting moving and keeping on top of their health.
It’s not always a bad thing, I guess. But a lot of the times, people are hell-bent on finding that quick-fix or secret supplement that will get them what they want. And even when and IF they do reach their goal, they revert immediately back to their old ways.
Take things like the excessive amounts of 6-week or 90-day challenges out there. They all revolve around people losing an extreme amount of weight in a short period of time. This leaves them to either revert back to their old ways and return next time the challenge is running, or simply continue on with the regime with the inevitable plateau or stalled progress always looming.
I might seem like such a hater, but the rare occurrence of people actually learning from a ramped-up fitness program combined with a super-low caloric deficit diet, is just that. Rare.
It’s not always about quick fixes, and even if it takes someone 5 years to lose their desired weight, it doesn’t matter. Because they stuck to their journey by learning the process of how to go about it and what types of life-long healthy lifestyle habits work for them.
Training and eating well isn’t just a ‘do it once a year for 2 months before summer’ kind of thing, it’s something that we have to stay on top of each and every day for the rest of our lives.
It shouldn’t be looked at like a chore, but rather habits in our lives that help ensure that we live better, happier and healthier for years to come.
Numero due.
Another thing Martin opened our eyes to were deep questions about ourselves like “what are your core values?”.
Good questions to even ask yourself right now.
Seriously, do it. Write down 3-5 things that you value in your life that you never deviate from. Things that you believe in wholeheartedly and essentially, what makes you… you.
Having trouble? Let me give you some examples.
Let’s say you value your education and you’re always bettering yourself, your health and you’re always looking after yourself, experiences in your life and you’re always looking for more.
Deviating from these means you deviate from who you are. And really, your integrity.
For those thinking it, yep, the above were a few of mine.
Numero tre.
Another question he asked us was “do you think that you can change your past?”
We, of course, looked at him blankly and waited for the inevitably-philosophical true answer.
He came back at us with “of course you can.”
A time machine, right?
Well, maybe. But have a think about this.
We may not be able to change what has happened in the past right now, but we all do have the ability every day to change what tomorrow’s past will be.
Man, that’s deep, right?
The power we hold over our own life and the opportunity to take charge is seriously there every day.
Small things like giving ourselves 1% of our day (yup, do the math – it’s only 15 minutes) to look after ourselves, should be high up on our priority list.
And really, what if we went crazy and gave ourselves a whole 2 or even 3% of our day to learn, grow, get better and/or look after ourselves?
What, is that too much or something?