Are You Reasonably Happy?

Good morning, and I hope this day finds you well.
Been busy trying to stay cool and productive. I
have found that the two are sometimes mutually
exclusive. For instance, helping my wife in the
garden in 103 degree heat is not cool even though
it is productive. It occurred to me that we
frequently make mistakes like this. It is our
nature to try to do two things at once or to set
unrealistic goals for ourselves and then become
disappointed by the outcome.

Consider career goals: we seek to make more money
to be able to afford more stuff, but we find that
making more money also carries greater
responsibilities, pressures and frustrations.
This, in turn, makes life, in general, less happy
and our careers less satisfying. So we may achieve
our goal of making more money, but at what cost of
happiness?

There's a lot to be said about having money. I'd
rather have money than not have it. I've
experienced periods of great abundance and great
famine. I've been blessed with periods where I
made more money in a single year than most make in
a lifetime, and other periods where I did not know
where the next check was coming from.

At age 50, with two kids, a first and second
mortgage, and being self-employed, it's all about
managing cash flow. In this insane economy, it's
difficult to see revenue consistency long into the
future. There's so much unknown and we have so
little control over the events that impact our
lives.

For many, it is a time of panic and uncertainty.
After months of watching my own 401K and SEP
retirement accounts drop to below 40% of their
value, I am only now beginning to see some growth.
But with all of these talks of false bottoms in
the market, it's difficult to know what to do or
who to trust.

And so lately I have been considering the
Serenity Prayer written by Reinhold Niebuhr:

"God grant me
the Serenity
to accept the things
I cannot change,
Courage to change the things
I can, and the wisdom
to know the difference.

Living one day at a time;
Enjoying one moment at a time;
Accepting hardship as the
pathway to peace.

Taking, as He did, this sinful world
as it is, not as I would have it;

Trusting that He will make all things
right if I surrender to His will;

That I may be reasonably happy
in this life,
And supremely happy with Him
forever in the next."

Whether you are Christian, Jew, Muslim, etc. is
not really a point I am trying to debate. Rather,
it is the difference between being "reasonably
happy" vs. "supremely happy".

What would it take for you to be "reasonably
happy"? For me, it would be consistent income and
work to pay the monthly bills and maybe put a
little away for retirement, the kids' college
education, and for emergencies. I want and need
love, too.

This is very different then when I was wrapped in
the corporate telecom wars in the 1990s. As a
fast-moving executive, I was tied into the
life-blood of the company, and as I worked around
the clock and traveled away from my family, I was
rewarded richly for my sacrifice. In those days,
it was all about passing "Go" as many times as
possible and seeing who could die with the most
toys.

The older I get and the more I live, the more I
place greater value in my family and in my faith
and hope for the future. I still work hard to pay
the bills, but I am focused more on being
"reasonably happy" as opposed to being "supremely
happy".

So how does this relate to you? Simple question:
what's your goal in life?

If you are self-employed as I am, where is your
focus? Are you setting realistic goals you can
achieve or are you constantly setting yourself up
for failure by mistaking dreams for goals? The two
are different. One is objectively possible if you
take the necessary steps to accomplish it. The
other is ether, unattainable and always out of
reach.

If you are employed (good for you!), are you
stuck in a rut where you are miserable or are you
hell bent on success no matter the cost? In either
case, you need to zero in on what you NEED to be
happy while you are here on Earth vs. chasing the
indefinable, impossible dream.

I'm not saying you shouldn't dream. I'm saying
beware of mistaking your dream for your goal. You
may be setting yourself up for failure.

Until next time,

Steven

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