Kay:
Hey there, gang, and welcome back! It’s Friday, August 28th and this is Episode 170. We’ve got a John Maxwell quote for you today. He says, “Happiness simply cannot be relied upon as a measure of success.”
Shi:
Now, we chose a John quote today because today, Friday, August 28th, we are driving to check into an Airbnb in Placerville, California….We’re SO excited! It is a small, little, adorable house, and we are holding up for three days there, because it is the virtual International Maxwell Certification this weekend!
Kay:
We are the marketing faculty for John Maxwell’s 30,000 coaches, speakers, and trainers in the John Maxwell team, and it is one of the roles that we play that we love the most in our life as business people, together! But, John’s advice has been just so integral to our success in these last five years. This quote, in particular, has been interesting, because this year of 2020 hasn’t necessarily brought a ton of happiness…
Shi:
Well, you so often hear people say, “I just want to be happy. I just want to be happy.” But, John’s really telling us here, that it can NOT be relied upon as a measure of success. Because, when you think about it – happiness can be found in anything, right? So, success is about intentionally chasing after something. You could be happy watching the ducks at the pond…You could be happy camping outside…Happiness is accessible, theoretically, all the time to us, but doing something that you would call a “success,” whatever that is, is something you intentionally work towards – which means you sacrifice for it, you grow for it, you make mistakes for it, you learn from it…and, all of those things are often painful, which is usually the opposite of happiness!
Kay:
It means that – if you are always, always miserable – that you might need to take a look at yourself and say, “There might be room for me to look around for some happiness and to find it here in this moment.”
Shi:
Truth!
Kay:
If you’re the type of person, who yearns for happiness, right? That is the thing you say. “I just want to be happy.” If you’re putting a bunch of conditions and circumstances onto that happiness like, “Oh, I just want to be happy, and I’ll be happy if…” or, “I just want to be happy and I’ll be happy when…” Those conditions and circumstances now lord over your emotions and then you’re stuck with being “unable” to be happy unless those conditions and circumstances are met…
Shi:
Well, you can’t access that happiness then! We were just talking earlier about happiness being “always available to you” because you put the conditions and circumstances of your choosing around it – rather than maybe trying to define happiness as that state of mind or looking at happiness as that chemical reaction, right?…We all know that feeling of “happy” inside your body, right?
Kay:
YAY!
Shi:
Like, “Yay. Excited for something!” You know you’re happy if you sense that congratulatory feeling. And, we have read a few books that have talked about that difference between happiness and joy. Joy being this deeper connection of something that cultivates from unhappy moments sometimes. So – for all the parents out there – there’s nothing more joyous than your children, but they do not always make you happy…
Kay:
Ooh, certainly not! And, there’s nothing more joyous than the fulfillment that comes from a project well done and executed, but it is not always like happiness, sunshine, and rainbows getting there! So, when you’re saying that happiness is your measure of success, you might never find yourself being the kind of “successful” that you want, because that happiness is available all the time. Now, if you say, I want to have a deep and everlasting JOY – that journey towards success is going to look a lot different than it would if you were just chasing “happiness.”
Shi:
Yeah! “I just want to be happy.” We hear that all the time, where parents say for their kids, “I just want them to be happy.” And, that’s a little bit sad – because you’re setting your own self, and your kids, up for disappointment! Like, “I just want you to be happy.” Which infers, if they don’t feel happy, they feel like they’re letting parents down, right? Because mom and dad… “They only wanted one thing for me, right? To be happy.” Think about the times in your life where you’ve put this own condition on yourself, right? “I just want to be happy.” “Why can’t I just be happy?” “I need to feel happy,” or, “I just don’t have any happiness.” That being such a one dimensional definition of success really limits you, instead of allowing you to create and find that ultimate joy, and that fulfillment that we were talking about earlier. So, to remind you, your John Maxwell quote for the day is “Happiness simply cannot be relied upon as a measure of success.”
Kay:
Which means…today’s quest is actually a wishing quest! We want you to wish us luck as we take on our very first EVER virtual International Maxwell Certification, and to, of course, go ahead and wish yourself a merry weekend! Remember, happiness is available to you all the time…the catch is just whether you choose to tap into it or not! Are you ready?
Kay & Shi:
Let’s quest!
