The Other Side of Happy

A friend recently said to me; if you have all these happiness strategies, why don’t you use them?

I had just finished telling her that I was dealing with some depression. 

Happiness is the crest. Life is a wave. Sometimes you’re in the trough; the winter, the exhale, the flexing of the muscle; before you relax, before you breathe in; before the season changes. Happiness is the heart of the movie and the climax of the story. Without the down moments you don’t have a story, and you wouldn’t have a life. 

With that in mind, these are my tips for maximizing the crest of your emotional waves, and bouncing back faster from the troughs. Successfully managing your emotions increases your overall life satisfaction.

If you don’t manage your emotions, someone else will. Understanding your emotions is one of a marketer’s main tools for manipulating you into buying what they’re selling. 

On that note; “Life is pain. Anyone who tells you otherwise is selling something.” -Wesley from The Princess Bride

In Man’s Search for Meaning, Victor Frankl describes how some prisoners chose to help each other with what little they had, even if it was sacrificing their last scrap of stale bread.

In the worst of circumstances, we have a choice what to do with how we feel. In those moments we make an agreement with the Universe what direction we are headed for our future.

If you’re alive, you’re likely aware that pain is part of it. You can either run from it or choose which pain you want. Each pain comes with its own set of results. 

The strategies on UniverseRules are for people who want to surf the waves of life and find every nugget of joy possible along the way. You can manage your emotions when life throws you a sh*tstorm instead of lemons. I want to help you grow a fruitful farm from life’s smelly fertilizer.

You may be inclined to think the goal—whatever your future “farm” may look like—is the destination. But the destination really is now; it’s riding the waves, finding meaning—and creating your own where there is none. Learning these happiness strategies is about taking the reins of your emotions rather than passing them off to the highest bidder. By choosing how you feel; how you deal with both pleasant and unpleasant emotions, you are choosing your present and your future.