4 Happiness Skills Anyone Can Learn

There are a set of specific, actionable skills & tools that will cause a person to be happy regardless of the circumstances they find themselves in.  The following is the short list that I suggest to all new clients.

1.  Give up being right.

2.  Accept the situation as it is and then take action.  

3.  Quit pretending you are a psychic who can tell the future.

4.  Stop protecting yourself from people who aren’t attacking you.

A Wall Street executive was managing billions of dollars in assets and yet he felt like nobody listened to him and that he wasn’t important.  This perspective had him feel repressed and defeated.  His positive results didn’t seem to match his

Monkey's got your back

unhappy mindset.  He was making money for his firm and the firm was doing well as a whole.  With further investigation it turns out that he felt like other people in the firm didn’t think what he had to say was important and therefore he was an outsider and not involved in making critical decisions.  He realized that taking on more responsibility was important but felt powerless to do so.

I asked him how he knew this was true.  He told me about incidents that had occurred the year before.  I asked him to give me something that happened this week.  He couldn’t even think of something that had happened in the last six months.  The Drunk Monkey was at it again.

The Drunk Monkey creates generalizations.  Example; you walk over, pet a dog and it bites you.  The next time you see a dog, it shoots your body full of chemicals that put you on the alert.  Do all dogs bite?  No!  But the survival mechanism will steer you clear of anything today that might have seemed dangerous in the past.

This system is great for making sure kids don’t touch the hot stove more then once but it’s terrible for everyday life.  A couple incidents that occurred a year ago that made him feel angry and unappreciated.  Since then, he’s been protecting himself against a whole bunch of people who aren’t attacking him and frankly, don’t even remember what happened.

I asked him to consider that he had changed, they had changed, times had changed, and the world had changed since then.  I asked him if he would be willing to run an experiment to put The Drunk Monkey into place so he could return to happy, fulfilled and satisfied with work.  He agreed.  Here’s what I told him to do.

Instead of trying to keep his ideas safe, instead of wondering how he could move his objectives forward; for the next week, find out what other people were committed to.  See what the other people in the company were working on and discover ways to contribute to each of the people in the company.  Make it a game.  See if you can contribute something to someone everyday for the next seven days.  An idea, a contact, a resource or even just an encouraging word.

Through this process, he shifted from protecting himself from all the people who weren’t attacking him, to being supportive and giving.  Within the year he became one of the most celebrated people in his company.  Everyone wanted to get him involved in their projects.  He was suddenly important.  The next year he was recruited away by a superstar in his industry and made a partner in the firm.  This was a five year dream that came true in one.  The trick was simple, he needed to be the change he wanted to see in the world, just like Gandhi said.

When you are happy, you are creative, approachable, flexible and easy to be with.  Add those characteristics to your skill set and you will see an immediate positive benefit.

Most people believe that happiness is something that occurs when the conditions of life are favorable.  But the truth is, happiness is the skill navigating challenging situations without getting reactive.  If you wait for happiness to find you, you’ll be waiting a long time.  Happiness is an inside job.

The way you play is simple. Whatever is offered, you take it. Whatever is suggested, you do it. Whatever happens, you declare it perfect. A lot of people get freaky about that. “Whatever’s offered? Matthew, what if people offer you drugs?” Come on, you’ve got to use discernment here, okay?

Usually someone is offering you things because you’ve been talking and they see that there’s some connection and they’re hooking you up. People suggest things because of what you’ve been saying. I’m not talking about people trying to sell you something, because that isn’t a suggestion.

So whatever is offered, you take it. Whatever is suggested, you do it. Whatever happens, you laugh and you declare it perfect. Open yourself up and say yes.

I look for sort of random, unusual opportunities or things that just come up. A buddy of mine, Phil Tyrone, I think you know him from, his website is 720CreditScore.com. Good friend of mine, known him for a long time, coached with me and he and I have become buddies since.

Phil calls me up out of the blue and says, “A good friend of mine is coming into town. He’s going to a LA Kings game, and he invited me to come, but I couldn’t go.” And he said, “Do you want to go to the Kings game? They’re going to have dinner beforehand. You can meet and hang out.” and I said, “Okay, cool.”

So I just say yes. It was an unusual opportunity, and I said yes. I have no agenda. So, I come walking into this room. We’re meeting in a restaurant beforehand, and I’m overwhelmed. You know, there’s about 19 people at this table. And it’s not just 19 normal people, it’s 19 of the movers and the shakers in my industry. So I’m thinking, “Whoa, wow!”. I sit down and I immediately start connecting with people. I’m asking about them and what they’re up to and what are their goals, dreams and where are they going and what are they doing, etc.

I connect with this one man in particular named Adam. Adam had just finished making a movie, and I was like, “Oh my god, how amazing.” So I’m just finding about this and immediately he’s reciprocating and wants to find out what I’m doing. Well, I’m in the middle of a little side project that I’m doing, is I’m creating a movie codenamed What the Floyd, that is about this 42-year-old man who is having a major crisis and breakdown in his life. And he gets in a car accident and he’s killed. And he has a near death experience and comes back and sees his life in a whole new way. And the whole thing is told with songs that I’m writing with my buddy David Keesee.

So I’m immediately intrigued by the fact that he just finished a film. He did it totally independent. He did it the way that I wanted to do my film. We got to talking, and he says, “Oh my god, I can help.” I was contributing to him, but then he turned around and started contributing to me. I went from confidence level two, that I was going to be able to do this movie the way that I wanted to do it, to now confidence level nine just in a moment!

I was not really out there in the world seeking out people who were going to help me with this. It just fell into my lap. It’s been a side project, background intention. I’ve been writing the songs and things like that, but not really focusing on how we’re going to actually do the production. But it’s an intention. It’s still there. It’s written down that I want to do that.

So the Perfect Game led me straight to it. And the Perfect Game will lead you straight to the things that you want as well. I recommend that whatever’s offered, you take it; whatever’s suggested, you do it; and whatever happens, you laugh and you declare it perfect. Remember to use discernment.

If you don’t acknowledge your conditioning, then happiness will not be your response to many, things. So the question is, how do you begin to condition yourself to make happiness your response? I think the easiest way to do that is to practice asking yourself questions that will get you back to a place that you want to be. I like to ask these questions: “How am I creating this? What good can come of this situation? What would be a more effective response? What do I want?”

See, when I ask questions like that, it pulls me back to what I’m doing rather than me reacting to what’s out there in the world. And I say happiness is not a choice. It’s a skill and you have to practice it.

So every time I work with someone, and they start to talk like, “Well, I don’t like this, and I don’t like that. He’s a jerk…” I ask them to start to examine themselves – who they are. Who is the person that is making the complaints? We find out that the person making the complaints actually has those same complaints, in some way, about themselves.

It’s usually an issue about themselves, but they’re unwilling to admit it. There are no jerks in the world until you show up. You’re the one that declares them a jerk, and you can declare them anything you want. Your resistance is what causes you to suffer, and your suffering is caused, ultimately, by your opinion. So why not change your opinion so that you can feel good? You change your opinion, you change your life.

What are you waiting for? I recommend that you do two things. One, do the ten-ten visualization. I like to, every day, spend a moment visualizing 10 things that I’m grateful for. And then, 10 of my goals and dreams. I just visualize. I just close my eyes, think about all the things I’m grateful for, and instantly, I start to feel happy.

And then, I take that happiness, and I put it into my goals and dreams, and it accelerates the accomplishment of my goals and dreams, which makes me more optimistic. I am operating optimally. Do you get that? Gratitude is a great thing. Another thing I like to do is just make a little, short gratitude list. I like to have a group of people that I send my gratitude list to. I have a little e-mail chain, and we all send our gratitude to each other. You know, it’s just, “I’m grateful for this. I’m grateful for that. I’m grateful for this.” And I make a list of just three or four things every single day. Try it, and notice how much more optimistic, powerful, and resourceful you become.

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The wisest thing to do is to ignore it and to say, “You know what, monkey, what is going to happen will be perfect. I have things I am committed to. I’m not being irresponsible. I do set goals and have objectives. But obsessing and going over and over and over it in my head right now really is not doing us any good.”

Another thing that the drunk monkey does that keeps you out of the present moment is it’s constantly thinking about the past. It’s regretting. It’s trying to re-write your past to make you look more favorable and it’s saying, “Well, that guy was wrong and he shouldn’t have been like that and that was really stupid and blah blah blah!” Just notice that you have so little control over this babbling and rambling in your head and that lack of control ultimately kills your bliss.

What you want to learn to do is ignore it. Try to constantly catch it and just say, “Shut up, monkey, I’m not interested.” Be right here, right now in the present moment. It’s very, very powerful. Lots of energy. Lots of joy. Lots of ecstasy available and waiting for you. But you have to learn to see or recognize the rambling in your head as completely irrelevant and then stop listening. And in that moment, you’ll be higher than you’ve ever been.

Are you using your spirituality as a cop out, a way in which you don’t have to be responsible for making your life amazing? I’d be willing to bet that there are places you’re doing that. Cut it out. Start using your spiritual principles to actually make your life extraordinary everywhere. Ultimately, a spiritual person is someone who is extremely responsible. Is that you?

The moment I see that there is a lot in my life that is working right now, I start to feel good again. The moment I feel good, I am more attractive. When I feel good, I am more charismatic. When I feel good, I’m smarter about stuff. When I feel good, I can take more effective action. When I feel good, I can say the right thing, do the right thing, you know, it’s just like you get in that flow. It’s all about your perception.

I hate to break the news that when you have that opinion, you’re going to suffer. And so consider that you’re holding people, the world and everyone around you accountable to agreements that they never made. You want to get out of the suffering? Let go of those agreements and begin to align with the way the world is and see what happens.