Defeating Unhappiness

At times I have felt defeated by life.

All I ever wanted was to be peaceful, happy, and free. I went about attaining it by deconstructing myself and my life and seeking spirituality to bring about peace and happiness. With spirituality figured out and practiced daily I waited for the immediate result that failed to appear. It wasn’t until some years later that I realized I was attempting to cheat the system. I was trying to become enlightened to see the light. Unfortunately that’s not how life works, you cannot get the answers to life’s challenges in advance. The act of waiting for happiness to be happy, or happiness procrastination as I refer to it, can be paralyzing. If we have a prerequisite of a certain condition taking place to facilitate happiness then we’ll always be waiting as opposed to being happy in the moment. If we fool ourselves into believing that we have to understand the reasons why we’re unhappy, the result will be getting stuck in that state of unhappiness. Instead, focus on forgiving the past without over intellectualizing it and bypass your way into the present.

What is the best way to defeat unhappiness?

Stop procrastinating by coming up with excuses to not be happy. This is not only self-defeating to you but does a disservice to the world, your family, and community at large. Life is about learning from your trials, failures, and misjudgments, so don’t lose any more time trying to solve the mystery of unhappiness and just live in the now.

How, you ask? The first step is to free all of your emotions fully whether it be sadness, anger, love, joy, or frustration. The more you feel the less you fight against the feeling, which deepens your capacity and potential for happiness. Step number two is to love yourself as you are and without apology. Stop putting prerequisites on your self-love and acceptance and continuing the self-defeating dialogue of, if only I could lose 10 pounds, get a new job, run a marathon, etc… Spiritual growth is not about self-improvement so don’t treat yourself as a home improvement project that is never quite good enough or finished. Embody spiritual maturity as unconditional love toward the life you are currently being offered.

I used to be a destination junky before I read Jon Kabat Zinn’s book Wherever You Go, There You Are. It woke me up to the fact that waiting to be happy until I was somewhere new and exotic was never the right solution. I still had myself and how I felt about me to deal with no matter how exotic the location or the distance from my office. I had to face myself with truth and honesty and admit that I was hungry for love. Just as Mother Teresa said, “The hunger for love is much more difficult to remove than the hunger for bread.” I felt that hunger.

The hunger cannot be quenched by material things, other people loving you, or going to exotic places–it has to be an internal shift of self-recognition that moves you to self-acceptance. As soon as that shift happened for me and I started loving myself I wasn’t starving anymore. That was the first day I made the commitment to my own healing. I ask you, how strong is your desire to live a healing lifestyle? Only you can make the choice to choose love and happiness each and every moment of every day.

From my heart to yours I wish the practice of yoga saves your life today as it does mine daily. I want you to love yourself more and in turn feel how loved you are by the universe herself. As Sutra 11.42 reads, “When at peace and content with oneself and others, santosha, supreme joy is celebrated.” You hold the key to your own happiness. The question is, do you have the courage to take the time today without delay to defeat unhappiness? You are everything and you have all you need to be happy so don’t waste another moment procrastinating.

Love yourself, love your day, love your life! ~Silvia

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Editor’s note: This is a guest post by Daily Cup of Yoga contributor Silvia Mordini, E-RYT, retreat leader, happiness coach, and yogipreneur. Enthusiasm to love your life is contagious around Silvia. Her expert passion connects people to their own joyful potential. Silvia lives her happiness in such a big way that you can’t help but leave her classes, workshops, trainings and retreats spiritually uplifted! Born in Ecuador, raised traveling around the globe, she is an enthusiastic citizen of the world and spiritual adventurer. She has over 10,000 hours and 15 years of teaching experience, owned a yoga studio for 9 years and after being run over by a car used yoga to recover physically and emotionally. Silvia leads Alchemy Tours Yoga Retreats and Alchemy of Yoga RYT200 Yoga Teacher Training.