Blog

Happy people focus on what they have: I’m often fascinated by our lives which is usually broken down into what we have and what we aspire for. True enough, it is not always easy to find a fair balance between the two. This is nothing to do with greed or any other emotions which people look down upon. This quote analysis is just about what you want vs what you have.

Does this mean that we should forget about aspiring for better goals in life? What about all the dreams we have which makes us want to do things? Should we give up on them? Perhaps that’s where you’ll find the crux of this quote – balance between things we have and the ones we don’t. (Source: Happiness quotes)Both of these have fascinating energies and emotions associated. This article is about cleverly making use of these emotions so that you can achieve what matters the most to you.

Happy people focus on what they have – Meaning

This is all about gratitude and being thankful for what we have. Gratitude has a very special effect on us – it helps us balance the challenges, disadvantages with the opportunities that we have. Our pain emotions can sometimes tell a lie and fixate our focus on what’s not working at the moment. In turn, that makes us amplify the things that we don’t have in life. Ultimately, our life is about our own ideals and standards, a pretty personal affair right?

What does it mean to say happy people focus on what they have? There’s a fine balance between being satisfied and happy. Personally, I believe that there is a beautiful balance between some unhappiness and happiness. I’m not encouraging you to be unhappy, but just pointing out that a certain amount of unhappiness is not as bad.

Your emotions are a beautiful guide to what you’re feeling at any point in time. The society and peers influence us by telling what we should feel. In this process, we lose out somehting very important – the ability to listen to our own emotions. We don’t live life by anyone’s standards. The same applies for your definition of happiness. It is and should be different from others. And if someone tells you to feel happy about what you have, then you have every right to ignore them and focus on what your mind is telling you.

However, please note that this comes with a fair bit of balance. You can’t always focus on what you don’t have to a detrimental effect. Remember, your emotions are there to help you – not to harass you. No one is 100% happy or unhappy. We all have moments which define these experiences and emotions for us. Don’t mistake these moments as permanent feelings. Try to listen to both these emotions and what they are trying to tell you.

Focusing on what you don’t have

I don’t want to preach you to not focus on what you don’t have. Like I said, what you don’t have also tells you that your mind is desiring something. Instead of lamenting or feeling bad about something you don’t have, your best results are in finding a way to achieve these things.

The emotion has done its job, it has told you what the mind is asking for. It is now upto you to decide what you want to do about it. Your choices are:

• Ignore it like the society asks you and find a way to feel happy. In other words – Compromise
• Be curious and ask yourself why do you want this and how it makes you feel
• Also ask – is the demand reasonable? And even if it is not, ask why you want this so badly
• Finally, look at what you can do to get there. It might not be a simple task, but yet there might be a way if you look deep enough.

I want to challenge the quote by saying – you ought to focus on what you don’t have as well. Don’t force your mind to feel something it doesn’t. The mind doesn’t work that way. Instead, listen to your emotions and focus these energies on doing something about it.

Identifying what you have

While I stand by the above explanation, I’d also like to point out that we can’t ignore the emotions about things we have. Our minds are focused on the next best thing in life. And often the mind responds to pain of not having something vs the satisfaction of having something. All I’m saying is – it is fine to be dissatisfied with a few things, but it is not fine to be miserable about it.

The feeling of misery doesn’t help anyone. It doesn’t help you solve the problem either. The best way you can do that is by ensuring that you celebrate for what you have. In here, the focus of discussion is happiness. You can still be dissatisfied, but find a way to be happy about things. At any point – your life is a representation of all the work you’ve done until now. If you aren’t proud or happy about the things that have led you here, you’re doing yourself a great disservice. In other words, you’re being unfair on yourself.

I don’t buy into the philosophy of being sad all the time to get attention from yourself. That’s not the way – your best results are in listening to your emotions respectfully and finding a route to achieve your results. It will be difficult but that’s where you have the happiness – happy people focus on what they have.

“Happy People Focus On What They Have,Unhappy People Focus On What Is Missing”