The quest of happiness is a cruel one. Many people think that happiness is a destination. Let’s settle this right now, Happiness is not a place, it is a default state. Nobody is born unhappy. Nobody is born depressed, anxious or fearful. In fact we learn all those things as we grow up. As more social, cultural or societal conditioning is exposed to us, we learn both what is acceptable and what isn’t, we also learn what is “cool” and not cool, especially during this age of social media. Just scroll through Instagram and see all the photos of people that seem to be richer than you, more “attractive” than you (although most of it is unrealistic, fake or heavily edited). Subconsciously, we compare ourselves. The more that we compare ourselves, the more we see that we aren’t there. We start to forget that our default state is happiness so we become complacent, we change into what we think will make us happy. We might not have the picture perfect abs, we might not have the million dollar house/car/jet , or the attractive partner. This creates a downward spiral. it makes you feel so inadequate. Like if you don’t have this or that, then you are not enough just by yourself.

With this in mind, many people take an alternate path. The doomed path. Here’s how it goes: because we think that without money, or looks or popularity, we aren’t enough. So in our heads, we believe that where we are, we aren’t enough, that we aren’t ,or rather, can’t be happy yet. So how can we become enough? By getting the thing, the object, the goal that we think we need in order to be happy. Do you understand? We start to think that only once we get the money or the fame or the looks, that’s when we can be happy. That’s when we can be enough. This is bad because now we are reaffirming the idea that we are not enough right now as we are. We are reiterating that we are unhappy. This also affects many self help students, as they believe that once they let go of all their fears, or anxiety, or their neediness, that’s when they can be happy. We have forgotten that we were born happy. That our fundamental state is happiness.

This is especially seen in the hustle mentality movement and in the self help community. Instead of accepting and loving themselves first, then looking to add to their already built foundation, the seeds of success, we obsess over what we don’t have, until what we do have fades into obscurity in our minds . Have you ever met someone that seems to have it all, the looks, the money, the fame… yet they are unhappy. They are anxious , they are depressed. This is because, instead of coming from happiness, they rather choose to need the materials, believing that it’ll make them happy. In fact, this mind-set leads many people to end up doing what they don’t love. They end up getting into the wrong relationship, they end up doing the wrong things for fame. This adds to their downward spiral.