The three points of happiness
The most important thing is to enjoy your life—to be happy—it’s all that matters. Audrey Hepburn
My mother once told me, not too long ago, that there are three points of happiness and wellbeing. These points actually come together to form a triangle with the main points being career/work, relationships/love and health/lifestyle.
The absolute ideal which leads to sublime happiness is to have all three points in your life, going smoothly. This means you’re happy with your job (anything where you’re working for money to support your lifestyle), your relationships are going well (this includes relationships with family, friends, a partner, a housemate etc) and you are in good health (if you’re able to get out of bed and go down the street, you’re in good health). So, ultimately the triangle I am referring to will look something like this diagram:
Having two points of happiness working out well, is normal. Generally there will be one point of happiness not quite going as smoothly as it could, and this is the area we need to work on. Two points of happiness means we’re content. We’re not sublimely happy but we’re not miserable either because we have enough in our lives to distract us from that one point that’s missing. Plus, it is easier to fix one missing point of happiness than it is to fix two or three of them!
If you only have one point of happiness working out, something needs to change quite quickly. It’s possible that we could be in bad health and a partner leaves us at the same time and adds a smear campaign that takes some of our friends with them. Or the partner leaves and we get fired from our job. Or we get sick and that interferes with completing our work to a usual standard, so we get let go or stop getting paid. There are many scenarios of how you could end up with only one point of happiness, the trick is to really pursue the other two points. Put your full focus into what’s not working and how you can change it to make it work and start taking steps towards it.
If you have no points of happiness, you’ve probably stopped trying. Things are really down and out for you at the moment. I would recommend seeing a psychologist at this point and get tips and strategies for how you can move things in a more positive direction to assist in getting you back on track. The good news is that it isn’t all that common to lose all three points.
What you need to remember is that if you have two points of happiness, then you can look at the other point and try to work out a way to change the situation to align all three points. What isn’t working with this point? Why isn’t it working? How can I change that? What are the steps to changing it? And then put your plans into action and make it happen.
If you only have two points of happiness, and you can’t adjust the third one – perhaps it’s out of your control for now – then your wellbeing will still be positive. It’s bearable to live with for quite some time, it just depends how ambitious you are to achieving absolute happiness.
I always keep the three points of happiness in mind, throughout my daily life. My mother shared them with me and someone shared them with her. It gives me constant goals to strive towards and it keeps life interesting and challenging. There have been times, even recently, when I lost two points of happiness – and it’s been a difficult time – but as long as you’re motivated you can get back on track.
How’s your life tracking at the moment? Find this blog helpful – please don’t forget to share it with your friends!
