Welcome to the ultimate happiness guide!

I’m going to teach you how to be happy by focusing on everyday habits that may be hurting you more than you realize. I tend to be concrete in my approach to helping people overcome obstacles preventing happiness from shining through. In fact, there’s usually an easy solution to every habit that harms your happiness. It’s just a matter of taking the time to look inward and think about your everyday behavior. Most habits are on autopilot, but they can be switched to manual if you’re motivated to make small but consistent changes to the way you conduct your day.

A Bit About Why We Sabotage Our Happiness

Happiness is something you have to learn how to accept. Otherwise, you will self-sabotage. You default sense of self dictates whether or not you believe you deserve happiness. At your psychological epicenter you maintain core beliefs about your worth, and for many of us these beliefs are distorted so badly that we reject anything good that happens because they’re not in sync with how we feel about ourselves.

Modern technological advances don’t help matters either. The lightning-fast availability of our phones further warps our relationship with happiness. Think about it — your phone allows you to feel like you can escape psychological pain on a moment’s notice and control your world by directing all of your focus to a tiny little, satisfying screen. You jump around your apps looking for anything that sufficiently satisfies your need for stimulation or escape. This habit, repeated 100 times a day, makes life outside of your phone less satisfying.

A Fix for 18 Happiness-Stealing Habits

Below are 18 problems and fixes. Tweaking the ones you relate to can skyrocket your happiness potential.

1. You’re afraid to make a big change that’s weighing on your conscience.

There’s so many directions I can go here. It all depends on what you fear would happen if you actually pursued what you REALLY want. What are you fearing will happen if you make the change you crave? Do you have an accurate view of your ability to cope with the psychological pain that this change will bring? Yes, you can survive for many years like this, but do you really want to? As far as your relationship is concerned, there’s always room for improvement if you want to be with him or her long term.

Your next move toward happiness: Start by working on overcoming resentment toward your partner, listening with (and modeling) a higher quality of attention and promoting open communication about the state of the union. If your job totally sucks, can you self-educate via online courses to build additional skills that will appeal to potential, new employers? Set a timeline for yourself with a commitment to making a switch if your job doesn’t improve. Are you even in the right career that matches your strengths and personality. Consider a few sessions with a career counselor and pick the brain of a professor, headhunter, or a person with knowledge of a field that speaks to you.

2. You think about money way too often. (In the pandemic this is less applicable)

Who doesn’t want more money? We all do, but some people are completely preoccupied with the pursuit of material wealth. An obsession with money detracts steals your life force from most areas of life that require your investment…your ability to value your relationships, the simple joys in life and so much more. But the real problem with constantly wanting more money is how it impacts your fantasy world and your interpretation of your everyday reality.

Your daydreams about what you’ll do with more money create an idealized state of existence that can never actually be experienced. In other words, frequent fantasies about money create a huge discrepancy between what you expect life will be like with more money and the ACTUAL experience of wealth should you gain greater wealth. Even worse, your current reality is steadily downgraded every time you dream of some other financial reality. You’re essentially feeding yourself the idea that life sucks now.

Your next move toward happiness: So what’s the cure, Doc? It’s not a cliche that the best happiness boosters cost nothing. Force yourself to cut back on fantasies about wealth. Think of good times with friends. Dream of your hobbies. Focus more on having a healthy mind and body. One more important point: Your view of money is usually a product of your upbringing. Consider therapy to examine your relationship with money and any unhealthy family influences. The Bottom line: The less you fantasize about money, the more it will buy you happiness. 

3. You’re too obsessed with changing yourself, which is making you stay the same.

Ok, now this might seem to contradict what I said about the importance of committing to personal growth, but I mean something different here. Happiness becomes severely limited when you’re preoccupied with changing something about yourself. The most common type of change addiction has to do with weight loss. People who diet constantly are highly prone to limiting happiness because they have trouble celebrating the reality of their existence. Change addiction actually keeps you the same. To make a change you usually have to come from a place of love or fear. If change is generated by self-loathing or low self-esteem, then you will inevitably undo whatever efforts you make to change. Your mind and body need a break from change, and self-acceptance is that place of peace and strength.

Your next move toward happiness: A desire to change requires self-love. You can love your body AND want to lose weight. If you’re trying to cut back on alcohol consumption, you can treat yourself nicely in other ways during the process. If you’re trying to stop smoking, you can work on creating other self-loving habits that promote health and wellness. Work on your self-talk. What do you say in your head that’s mean and degrading? For every three moments of wanting something else, force yourself to think about the things you currently love about yourself with regard to the quality you want to change. Don’t wait for some horrible event to be the motivating force behind change. You’ll regret it.

4. Too many things make you feel guilty.

Guilt is a dangerous emotion. It’s the equivalent of two opposing forces acting upon you at the same time, with the net effect being that you suffer in a powerless and painful state of non-action. One side of you says, “I should really do this.” I have news for you. Most thoughts that start with the phrase “I should” do much more harm than good. Should-thoughts are paralyzing and they RARELY lead to action. (See Albert Ellis, an amazing psychologist who perfected the theory around the shoulds.) If the shouldsrepresent one force that destroy your ability to act to resolve a problem, the other side of the equation is the shame and disgust that you feel about not doing what you think needs to get done. You ruminate about the potential consquences of what you’ve done or failed to deal with and it freezes you. The end result is obsessing about what you should do while feeling terrible about yourself, which hurts you on so many levels because ultimately, you’re stuck feeling the psychological weight of something unfinished and messy. Why? Here’s the answer….

Your next move toward happiness: Feeling guilty implies that you owe a debt to yourself or someone else before you can authorize yourself to be happy. Ask yourself (or a few well-respected people) if you truly owe a debt. Examples of a debt unpaid are usually either about (1) avoidance, such as ignoring the texts of someone you need to apologize to or avoiding checking your bank account for any unwanted recurring subscriptions or (2) breaking a commitment, such as neglecting your need for “me time” when you have children who depend on you. Maybe you’ve already payed your debt and never fully acknowledged it to yourself. If you think you’re still in debt, pay it! But if you can conclude that no owe nuttin’ to no one, then you’re having what’s considered “false guilt,” which necessitates that you tell yourself 30 times that you have no reason to feel guilt and act accordingly. New mothers are at high risk for this problem.

5. You’ve forgotten how to sit with your own thoughts.

If you can’t be with yourself — uncomfortable thoughts and all — why would someone want to be around you? Do you jump from one vice to another? One app to another? One news site to another? Do you have the patience to sit for five minutes away from your phone? Can you avoid TV for a night?

Your next move toward happiness: Commit to a longer process of developing your spiritual side, which promotes patience and self-acceptance. Read or listen to books by Thich Nhat Hanh and Pema Chodron. Essentially, you’re probably having difficulty sitting with your thoughts for a long enough period of time. The goal is to recognize that just because you think you need something right now doesn’t mean you have to have it. Interference that prevents you from constantly satisfying your needs can be helpful over the long run. Spend time with someone who can inspire you to figure out which slower-to-develop, longer-lasting happiness generators you can invest in.

6. You can’t shake the nasty habit of procrastination.

If you can relate to this, I’m going to venture a guess and say that you fear failure…and possibly even success (getting what you actually want). Add bad habits to a fear of failure and you have the recipe for avoidance. Think of procrastination as a crafty way to make sure that life verifies your negative qualities.

Your next move toward happiness: First some practical advice. Have you ever heard of functional procrastination? It means doing something not directly related to what needs to get done, but an action that will make you feel like you’re taking care of some other task in the spirit of gaining a sense of personal control. For example, if you need to send an important work email but you just can’t bring yourself to do it, try cleaning the kitchen counter, starting your laundry or cleaning off the top layer of mess on your desk. This allows you to feel more productive and reduces the shame and self-doubt associated with avoidance.

If that doesn’t help, do the task you’re avoiding in your head while engaging in functional procrastination. As far as the email example is concerned, you would construct the email in your head while you’re making basketballs out of useless mail cluttering your desk. Trust me. You’ll feel better about yourself and it will make the dreaded email feel less dreadful.

On a psychological and internal level, strive to have the humility to accept that you need outside help to create better habits and dispel your irrational beliefs about failure. Therapy can be helpful. The risk is that you’ll actually achieve the change you’ve always wanted. Ultimately, you must face what you’re constantly trying to avoid. Keep a log of new events that you want to avoid. Write down all of your beliefs about why you want to avoid. Dispute each belief with or without a mental health professional. Time how long it takes you to face what you’re running from and try to repeat your successes in future scenarios.