


In a really simple way, I see this all the time around the yoga room. When people practice poses, they get poses. When people practice feeling and getting to know themselves ... wow. They get wow! It's pretty cool what you get this way. You get you.

So does the same thing work for happiness? Can we point right at happiness and get all kinds of happy? We can! Is it that simple? Well, there might be a few tricks, bumps and sinkholes along the way. But we can do it!

Happiness begins not just with the hour we spend in a yoga room, or a gym, on a run, or at mealtime with friends. Happiness begins and lives in how we move through our lives, all day, every day. Happiness begins and lives in your "You View," in how you view yourself.

Do you think you have the power to get happy, through simple things that you control, in every moment of every day? You're right! But if your You View is something different — if you think the world is just a tough place, and nothing real is won except through stress and strain — you're also right, because that's exactly what you'll get.

Your "You View" is in how you move all day in your life. It will carry across how you exercise, how you eat, how you relate to everyone in the world around you. You're important!

So let's create our own personal happiness movement. How? We're going to change the goal. With every single pitfall, we're so often aiming at the thing we think will be the driver of our happiness. Even if it hasn't ever worked! So we're going to change that goal. We're going to point right at happiness. Not the imagined driver of happiness. Just, happiness. Let's get moving.

Here are three pitfalls you can avoid — and three happiness wins you can bring into your life — every single day, all day long.

3 Happiness Pitfalls

1. Thinking you need more money.

We all know this one. And if our starting point is knowing we're safe, have shelter, enough water to drink, and food to eat, we even know this money thing just isn't true. So how do we change it? Change where you point. We'll keep at this one!

2. Believing you have to have the right job.

I've seen people working jobs that aren't their favorite; they sit back and do the minimum, while wanting that next better job, because that's what they deserve. It doesn't work! Whatever you want, you have to be it right now. And with some experience in the work world, you're going to find that senior management generally wants you to perform at two levels up from the job you have, before moving you to the next level up. It's just how things work, and sometimes that's OK. Because it simply says, be all of what you can be, right now. Again, change where you point.

3. Relying on a relationship to make you happy.

Oh boy, what can I say about this one? Walking through life with someone, sharing this life with someone you love: I've always believed this is the most important thing. So what if that someone isn't here right now? Maybe worse, what if that becomes more like living and waiting for someone else, and less like living and creating for you? Don't wait. You'll be happier pointing right at you, right now. The person you're walking with will be happier, too!

3 Happiness Wins

1. All the money in the world is mine!

It might sound silly, but it's also silly to chase around outcomes. Money is an outcome. Point at happiness. Go for what you love, and let the rest take care of itself. Because that's what it does anyway! Plus, all the money in the world really is yours. We're all in this together!

2. Be amazing in the job you have now.

Even if you don't have a regular job, whatever work you do, be amazing in it. How? Be you. Bring it on out. You pointing at happy you, that's going to be some really good work, no matter where you are.

3. Be amazing in your relationships, right now.

Even more clear, be amazing in your relationship with you. Wow, that's going to knock everyone's socks off! Again, where are you pointing? You're pointing at you, happy, right now.

The thing is, happiness is a "right now" kind of thing. I know, we're so tuned toward delayed gratification. Again and again, we tell ourselves "To get happy, I just need x and y, then I'll achieve z, and then we'll take that great big happiness vacation!"

But you know that doesn't work. We all know it, because we've been down that road. We know where it goes. Happiness isn't down the road. It's right here. That's the only place it is.

So play your happy music. Turn it up! Lie down in the grass and look at the sky. Get moving, right here, right now, wherever you are. Relax and feel you. Breathe deep. Believe that what you feel is worth responding to, and respond! Move your body, right now, how it feels good to move.

The beauty of our mind-body connection is that you're one whole happy interconnected being. Work on one part, and you inevitably impact everything you are. So when you move happy in your body — when you move yourself to feeling good, every time you're feeling not so good — you are right then and there changing your You View. Right there, you are putting yourself in your own happiness driver's seat. Right there, you are pointing right at happy, and changing everything.

Let's get moving happy together right now! Here's an anytime, anywhere practice video to get things started.


Michael Taylor
Michael Taylor
Read More
More from the author:
Check out The Complete Guide To Yoga
View the class
Michael Taylor
Michael Taylor
Read More

Related Posts

Popular Stories

Sites We Love

Loading next article...

Your article and new folder have been saved!