Hello guys,
let me share with you a thought from Alan Watts about goals and all :)

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There's this idea from Alan Watts that I keep coming back to whenever I feel too obsessed with a goal: the more you strive for happiness, the worse you feel in the process - and the more you accept your unhappiness, the better you feel about your situation.

Let me make it a bit more concrete.

Say you live alone. You focus on how much happier you'd be living with someone, if you had a partner. So you decide to make it happen: dating apps, going out with friends and their friends, bars, all of it - trying to find this person, trying to reach the situation that will finally bring you what you want, that will finally make you happy.

Let's say it takes a year. During that year, you go home alone 365 times. You feel unhappy, lonely, disappointed - at least 365 times. And then you finally meet someone, and by the logic of expectancy-value theory, you end up less happy than you expected to be anyway.

Now let's switch it around.

Same setup: you live alone, and you realize life would be nicer with a partner. But this time you decide to embrace the current situation as much as you can - to actually enjoy the solitude, and still make an effort to meet someone, but not because then and only then will you be happy. You do it simply because you want to give it a chance.

So, you focus on the day in front of you and on the positives inside what is, objectively, a negative situation. For example, perks such as: you get to watch what you want; nobody's tossing and turning at night and waking you up; no arguments about dinner, pets, in-laws. Yes, you'd still like a partner - but it's not the primary goal anymore. It's just a nice add-on to your life.

In this version, it still takes a year before you meet that person. But those 365 times you come home alone, you do it with peace. You're not happy - something's still missing, no denial here - but you're not unhappy either.

You're content.

Takeaway

The paradox is almost annoying in how simple it is: the harder you chase a goal:

• the more miserable you get in the process;
• the less you enjoy everything else along the way;
• and the higher the expectations you pile onto that goal

The trick isn't to stop wanting things. It's to stop making your peace conditional on getting them.

Talk to you soon,

Evie

EvieRan MSc in Psychology · University-trained coach · Author