Perhaps Happiness is NOT a CHOICE?

Since breaking my neck and ended up paralyzed when I was 18. One of the main questions I get asked all the time is why am I so happy? Why am I was tend to be positive? Well, first of all, I'm not always happy. And secondly, I'm not always positive. And I suppose the perception of someone that is severely paralyzed, the perception is, well, if they were me, they would not be that happy. And they will struggle with that. I can understand that. But I want to address the question of whether happiness is a choice and whether I chose to be happy, choose the positive way. And that's what I'm going to talk about on today's podcast is happiness a choice, and I don't think it is. And I'm going to explain why I'm Steven Webb and this is stillness in the storms, and I help you to find that inner peace when you might find it difficult to have, especially during difficult times. And I broke my neck at 18 years old and diving into swimming pool. And since then, yes, I'm paralyzed in a wheelchair and yes, I've got other problems with my life. Things. I suffer from something called autonomic dysreflexia, which basically means if anything goes wrong below my level of injury, my blood pressure goes really high and we're talking sometimes of like 240 or 160. There's like, it's not just high-level way to really high and it's dangerous and it can lead to a stroke or death in about 20, 30 minutes. So it's a medical emergency and it needs my carers to deal with it. Well, okay. Normally it's because I need to get toilet or I've got something else wrong with me. I'm sitting on a crease or some things really hurting me that I'm not realizing because I don't feel anything. I don't feel anything below my, just about my nipples. That's the easiest way of explaining it. I don't feel my hands. They're all paralyzed as well. So I've got loads of other problems. It's not just I'm paralyzed, but yes, I'm essentially quite happy person. And I do toy with that question is w why am I happy and why other people aren't and you might look at it and go, well, maybe when you have a serious accident and you face death, like I did. Maybe you realize the importance of life? Yeah, it could be, it could be something like that. Or maybe it's just that I was born this way. Maybe it's in my DNA, but then I look up my parents and my family. And no, they're not as positive and as happy as me. No, all the time. And would they be in my position? I don't know. May be are genes are set up. That if we have a catastrophic accident and maybe the genes are like, Oh, well, realign and be happy. I don't think that's the case, but who knows. So really is happiness a choice. And I used to think it was, I used to think I chose to be happy. I wake up in the morning and I choose to be happy and yes, essentially, I choose to do my gratitude practice. I choose to do the positive things. I choose to try to find the gift in situations. Like, I don't think of an alternative to my accident through rose tinted glasses. I don't think of like, if my accident hadn't happened, I don't think I would have been majorly successful. I would have been rich. I would have had my dream car, dream house, dream family, picket fence, you know, all that travel the world and everything. I don't think that that. Would have happened. I think I'd have probably ended up in a worse accident. I was an idiot driving the car. I was the kind of person that, you know, if, if bones could be broke, I found a way of doing it. And I just happened to break the, probably the worst bone in my body. Um, so yeah, I'd have property made my life a whole lot worse if I hadn't ended up in a wheelchair like this, my life would have probably been worse. So one thing I don't look at my life as I've got the bum deal, I just have the deal got in. There was no other deal on the table. It is what it is. It's thus one thing I tend to as a member, but as I'm older than the more I think about it, the more I think I don't choose anything. If you really think about that, the moment I choose happiness, that means I'm denying my sad times. I'm denying unpleasantness. I'm I'm trying to push away what I don't like. So therefore that creates a duality. I want this, I don't want that. And therefore I choose preferences and therefore I label everything as. I really don't like that. And I do like this. I like them. I do not like them. I that's a good person to hang around with us, a bad person hanging around with us. A good opinion, as a bad opinion, as nice ice cream, that's terrible ice cream. So, when you think of happiness is something you choose, you have to automatically have the ying yang and the opposite to that. And yes, of course it is. Of course, it's true. There's people I prefer to be with and there's ice cream. I prefer to eat. I have preferences. Of course I do. But if we can, especially during our everyday life, if we can just sit back and not choose anything. So imagine waking up in the morning and just saying, I'm not going to choose happiness today. I'm just going to choose to accept whatever happens and be okay with that and deal with whatever happens. I'm just going to be okay with and be open and just respond to whatever happens today. If someone has a different opinion than me, I'm going to listen. If someone says something I dislike, I'm just going to be okay. And I'm not going to do anything with it. So I'm not going to choose to try to stay in my state of happiness. So. Imagine how that would fail if you're not trying to stay a place where you think you ought to be. See, I think a lot of people and myself, when I try to be happy when I want to be happy. When I set out on a day that this has given me the most amazing day, and this is going to be the down, I'm going to be happy. This is going to dang, swore out my life and I'm going to well by 10 o'clock in the morning, I've already lost half of the day because I've gone in Eastern something and I shouldn't have done the wife. Not done the exercise or I haven't done my, my morning tasks that I was going to do. So it doesn't last long. First of all, and I certainly don't end up in a happy, happy state, but I do end up feeling content fulfilled, always called unreasonable joy. You could call it. When I just don't choose something for the day. Of course I have set out plans or what I should get done, I would like to achieve. And I tend to get most of those things done. I am not too bad. I'm getting better. I have systems in place where I get a lot of stuff done, but I don't look at it that I've got to get it done, that my life will be over. If I don't. You know, if I don't get a podcast, on Friday. I don't get a podcast on Friday, you know, and okay. Life isn't like I'm depending on it. But the reality is the more and more we try to choose happiness. The more and more it's really difficult because we're trying to deny aside that exists. It's like, as if you're trying to only choose positive friends, you going deny our friends that are positive at times. When we just accept life for what it is, we accept this moment for what it is without trying to make it something else. Then I think we end up by default happy or anyway, I think the default position of any human is to be happy. I don't think happiness is this place that is above and beyond the normal mundane. You know, if you have really bad day and you get to the doctors and you're diagnosed with something that you really don't want to be diagnosed with, you just want to get back to the mundane day when it was normal. That would be your current happiness based on the relative level of where you've ended up while at the doctors. So, yeah. And I talk about this happiness line quite a bit, and I'm sure I've done a podcast on the happiness line if I have an I will next week, but I think happiness is really in the mundane and it's really in the not choosing. Don't get I bed to my morning and choose to be happy. Don't get out of bed tomorrow morning and expect your day to go a certain way. Just embrace whatever the day brings. While keeping an eye on what you should be doing in gallon and what you should be doing. I'm not saying sit back and just allow the world to take control of your life. Not at all, but I'm saying don't choose the outcome of everything. Don't decide of how things should be. So I don't think happiness is a choice. I think the more we try to choose happiness, the more we'll be disappointed. That's my thoughts for today. I may not be right. Throw them away. You know, it's only my thoughts at the moment? A couple of years time, hopefully I'll revisit them and I will be wrong again, you know, be okay with that it's school. Cool. Um, thank you for listening. If you can hit the sub the subscribe button, it's follow on Spotify, and I think it's follow on iTunes at the moment. I think they've just changed or they go into in the next update or something, and then you'll be notified when I drop a new podcast Yeah, that'd be awesome. I'm trying to build up a thousand regular listeners. That would be just so amazing. And you're part of that. You'll be helping me do that. So thank you. Just hit the sub and subscribe on your favorite platform. Make my day. Thank you. Take care. This is Steven Webb and this is Stillness in the storms podcast. Don't forget to subscribe. I love you guys. Take care. Namaste.