When we get what we want, we no longer want it.

And soon we want something else.

A lifetime can be spent pursuing some specific goal or dream, but it doesn’t take long to get used to achieving it and wanting something else – something more.

Be on the lookout for unexpected gifts – things that we may never have thought of had it not been for adversity of luck.

Not getting the job you want often leads to getting something better – unexpected, even in another field.

Pursuing riches can ruin a life when being poor can help define what riches are.  There are a lot of wealthy people who are unhappy because no amount of money guarantees happiness.

Instead of always pushing for what you think you want, try this.

Be open to what comes your way.

That way you won’t miss something that came to you as a gift that you ordinarily would have failed to recognize.

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The Philadelphia Eagles (and former Patriots) defensive end is giving away his entire base salary of $1 million this year to educational charities and causes.

Long is an outstanding football player but even a better person because he is one of the rare few who acts on the premise that money can’t buy happiness.

As I used to tell my aspiring USC students understandably anxious to get going and get rich – all of Los Angeles is filled with psychologists and psychiatrists trying to help people be happy in spite of all the money they have.

This reminds me of a special friend of mine who used to say that you don’t have to be rich to give of yourself.

The most important gift of all is the gift of your time that is certainly worth something and of great value to others.

GoFundMe accounts prove every day how willing people are to give of themselves to help others with their problems, needs and even dreams.

It has been shown that our brains are patterned by the way we think.

The gift of generosity can start today with or without money and it changes at least two lives – yours and someone else’s – if not others.

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Gallup says 79% Americans in a recent survey said they experienced stress frequently (44%) or sometimes (35%) in their daily lives.

Just 17% said they were stressed rarely and a lucky 3% who said never.

59% say they lack the time to do what they want.

That’s in a world with more tools, more devices, more apps designed to make life easier.

Children and work are the reasons.

Women feeling more stressed than men because they still carry disproportionate childrearing workloads although men and women equally think they don’t have enough time to do what they want.

Older people (above 50) feel less stress from childrearing.

Stress is also impacting Millennials in a bigger way than previous generations.  They have high expectations, want to do more, have had fewer employment opportunities and even though they are connected through social media, they are suffering from being too connected and unable or unwilling to separate from their devices.

Balance trumps stress.

There is no such thing as good multi-tasking.

Reclaiming life by disconnecting more from phones and mobile devices is a good start.

And Millennials are beginning to have the conversation about being less connected even as older generations are staying more connected.

Phones are tools not a way of life.

Children are the responsibility of all parents in their lives not predominantly one. 

Saying no is the gift that busy, well-intentioned people should give themselves to reduce stress.

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Angry men from 20-40 in a recent University of Iowa survey were one and a half times more likely to be dead 35 years later than those who are calmer.

But, there is good anger and bad anger.

The bad anger is hurtful to others, striking out at them in frustration and keeps the turmoil boiling to the advantage of no one.

Channeling anger in a positive way to deal with it and to move on is also important because if there is one thing we are learning in our society it is that stress kills and harboring angry feelings is stress.

Loud screaming and yelling is not appropriate.

Saying what bothers you in a clear and honest way is therapeutic.

It is not an invitation for continued abuse but more of a declaration of independence from the kind of stress that eats us alive.

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A picture is worth a thousand words.

Below, is Austin Ardman who died two years ago December 8^th by a texting driver.  His father gave me permission to remind everyone that no message, no call, no fear of missing something is more important than the safety of our most precious assets.

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When bad things happen for some reason they seem far worse than when good things happen often hijacking the way we feel about our lives.

One way to put it all in perspective is to grade your day from 1 to 10 with a happiness score just before you turn in at night.

You may have a lot of 5s but you may have also posted a few high scores and some dreadful low scores.

The point is by looking at your month on a calendar to inspect the scores, you may find that you had two or three awful days and a lot of pretty good ones.

By seeing it this way, it prevents a calamity from making you feel like things are worse than they feel in the scope of a month.

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One absolutely effective way to get along with a difficult person is to find something you have in common and ask the other person about it.

It may be sports, a hobby, interest or a goal.

Difficult people are not just hard on us.  They are hard on themselves and often their own worst enemies.

Step in and start fishing for the one thing you have in common.  They’re not likely going to tell you without you searching.

Keep asking questions until you find something of mutual interest.

Then start asking questions rather than making personal statements.

It’s harder to be difficult when you find something in common.

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Watch a sports team when the wheels come off their game.

They bear down, try too hard (yes, too hard) and they start repeating negative thoughts.

Ironically in sports, losing streaks often follow winning streaks because teams get cocky and winning streaks follow losing streaks because they get down on themselves and eventually get off their own backs.

The thing is to keep motivation high and expectations reasonable.

No one can avoid ups and downs in life.

The ups seem like they speed by and the downs seem like they will never end.

But they always do.

The way to handle a prolonged losing streak is to commit your mind to believing that no matter what, things will not be bad forever.

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Sports teams break down the entire season’s schedule into smaller pieces to gain higher performance.

That way, it’s easier to focus on the task ahead instead of everything you have to do.

A losing streak doesn’t get to be so much pressure because there is a chance to hit the reset button every 30 days.

For us, seeing things on an incremental basis – say, 30 days or less – helps us keep our eyes on the goal.

It is very forgiving when we hit a rough patch and very stabilizing when everything seems to be going our way.

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Self-absorbed people are not new.

They just have many more tools now to get into our face and ears.

One person’s obsessive behavior rambling on about themselves can easily become a stress causing response in the person who suffers such one-sided relationships. 

• Ask what would you lose if you step away from them – Be specific.  Often the addiction to people who care only about themselves and their lives is made easier by asking exactly what you would lose if you ended the conversation.
• Cut contact – The more you let them know you are not available to listen to them talk incessantly about themselves, the sooner they will take it elsewhere.
• Find someone interested in you, too – Turn the previously wasted time of suffering from one-sided friendship and invest it in a person truly capable of being interested in your life.

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If you want to end unhappiness this morning, repeat these words:

EVEN THE BAD TIMES ARE GOOD

It’s easy to say, but difficult to accept.

But if you could, whatever is troubling you now automatically gets put in its proper place – a problem, a concern, a recurring worry – but not the end of the world.

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It’s back there somewhere – the thought of potential failure.

It’s silent.

It’s always present.  Some days louder than others.

Triggered by something that can be random like a failure in another area of your life totally unrelated.  (Sounds like I’ve been down that road).

You can block it out, but it’s still there.

How to turn that voice in your head into a positive?

• Only listen to it once a week – Not compulsively every day until it brings you down.  Once a week.  For no more than 30 minutes.  So when you feel that voice getting louder, you say “I’ll deal with you openly and honestly Tuesday night for a half hour on the way home”. 

• For every negative, a positive — During the half hour be frank about your negative thoughts.  Avoid discounting them no matter how troubling they may be (i.e., “I’m afraid I’m going to mess up my presentation”).  For every true negative thought, find an off-setting positive thought (“No one here knows the subject matter better than I do”). 

• Get out of knocking yourself down — Speak up for you the way you would have a friend do it.  No matter what the fear, do not buy into it.

Successful, happy people accept failure and learn from it.  But they don’t bring it on by letting doubting voices takeover their minds.

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When your elevator arrives, you step forward and walk in.

Here’s a young mother who pushed her baby stroller in when the elevator doors opened.  And although elevators are statistically very safe, it was an assumption that caused the accident.

In life, we assume things that are not fact.

A fact is something that can be observed and verified.

Most people are very smart whether or not they have a formal education.

Where it goes wrong is our propensity for assuming something is true when it is not a fact.

Lots of friendships breakup as a result of assumptions made.

Dreams are broken before they start when they are based on accepting something as true when it has not been proven.

If you’re working on yourself – one good place to increase your effectiveness and happiness is to remind yourself to frequently ask this question:

“Am I making an assumption or do I have proof”?

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Remember that feeling in grade, middle or high school?

The feeling of being excluded – left out.

It would be nice if children outgrew excluding others when they became adults.

SnapChat allows young people to create their own groups and only include the invited – a step stronger than simply having people “friend” you.

You can’t do anything about other people’s behavior but while they are out excluding people, you can be making great friends by being inclusionary.

Be thoughtful enough to make sure everyone is included in the event.

It’s shocking how many companies fail to invite people who sit outside their doors to be part of teams.  Invite them in.

Reach out to those left out.

Before this day ends, include someone in an activity or a simple conversation and watch how making them feel wanted will make you feel better.

Only weak people exclude others.

Strength of character comes from standing up for and alongside people who bring diversity to our lives.

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Add digital addiction to the other addictions that ruin people’s lives.

There are rehab programs popping up as the need increases and some psychologist specialize in treating the anxiety that results from being connected too much.

Yet, just like the excuse “I can handle one drink”, formerly happy people are finding themselves deeper and deeper in 24/7 stress by not recognizing their real limits.

1. Limit your connectivity to specific times and durations.

2. Come to understand that scrolling through a Facebook or Instagram feed is a “black hole” to be avoided or at the very least, limited. Set a stopwatch on your phone with how long you will stay involved in social media.

3. Don’t check back so frequently.  You won’t miss anything more important than what is happening in the present.

4. I have 2 screens on my iPhone for things like my Uber app, weather, etc.  Everything else is in folders titled “games”, “social media”, “podcasts”, “news”, etc.  Anything in a folder gets a time limit and every app on screen one and two is a short-term distraction.

5. Spend as much time on the phone (speaking and listening) or in-person as you spend on your phone.

Digital addiction can be avoided, but first you have to admit that there is a problem.

52% of Millennials have digital addiction so they may be among the first to step up.

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The captain is not the last person to go down with the ship.

We know this from forensic evidence of vessels that have sunk.

In fact, the captain is among the first to abandon ship preceded only by the crew.

Unlike passengers the crew is trained on how to survive at sea.

Yes, the women were left to save themselves only followed by – believe it or not – the children.

This does not mean that everyone jumps overboard. There are occasional tales of heroic and selfless actions that have saved others at the expense of their own lives.

No matter how much you trust others whether earned or imagined, always be prepared in life to depend on yourself.

Not the person who promises a promotion.

Or the friend who insists they will be there for you no matter what.

If you’re that fortunate, be grateful.

Otherwise prepare every day by learning to count on the most dependable person you know – you.

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Students learn less when they use a laptop or tablet to take notes in class and presentations.

And their grades are worse than those who do not use these note taking aids.

They distract users from receiving the message and distract those around them.

This spells trouble in corporate meeting rooms and at presentations where digital devices are standard equipment.

The people who look like they are trying to absorb the most from the content presentation are actually hurting themselves.

In random tests at Princeton and UCLA, students who used pen and paper outperformed the digital note takers.

Some professors discourage or outright ban the use of laptops and tablets because smartphones can take pictures of handwritten notes that can be stored later on a student’s computer.

The point is – access to information and ease of absorbing such information is turning about to be secondary to focusing on the content in real time and thinking about it.

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People tend to cling to memories of the past as they become older or even as they experience success at a younger age.

Memories are made of successes and while they feel good to reflect on, they feel even better in real time going forward.

Do, don’t stew.

Start something new — don’t just review past successes.

Engage someone new – a person you don’t normally contact, spend time with or have a dialogue with.  Start one.  One new outreach a day, brings 365 potential people some of whom can enrich your life (and you theirs).  It only takes one.

Life is like a concert.

We enjoy songs from the past but we also appreciate brand new lyrics and beats – preferably together in a nice balance.

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Dale Carnegie says the only way to get the best of an argument is to avoid it.

For those caught up in their own or someone else’s drama, these steps are helpful:

• Listen – Listening helps eliminate the feeling of self-defense that is triggered when another person is coming at you in an argument.  Showing that you are attempting to listen and understand is the first line of defense.
• Acknowledge the argument – Being able to repeat the other person’s complaint is proof that you are listening even if you do not agree.
• Support the argument – Supporting the other person’s right to disagree helps pave the way for your right to have your own – differing – opinion.

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Step 1 – Write down your top 25 career goals

Step 2 – Circle only your top 5 options

Step 3 – Put the top 5 on one list and the other 20 on a second list

Then give the top 5 list all your attention and avoid at all costs the second list until you’ve succeeded with the top 5.

This concept also works for daily to-dos.

Step 1 – Write down your tasks for the day

Step 2 – Circle only your top 5

Step 3 – Put the top 5 important tasks on one list

Give all your attention to that list until they are completed and then you can add more.

Multi-tasking is a myth that studies prove does not produce more efficiency and does create more anxiety.

Focus your time and energy on things that matter most.

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