For Book: Do You Seem Happier Than You Are

[ckelly78z]

Quote:

Originally Posted by COcheesehead As I have grown older, I try to be more honest with myself and others. So I at least try to present the real me. I am generally positive and when I am not happy people know it. So I is, what I is. No hiding behind a false facade.

Being myself sometimes brings brutal honesty which can be perceived as being angry all the time (as my wife, and grown daughter say), so should I put on a happy face for them also ?

[Amethyst]

I am also known for being direct and straightforward, but haven't been told it makes me seem angry.

"Delivery" matters. But I would never advise anyone to be less than honest, to sugarcoat the truth, etc.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ckelly78z Being myself sometimes brings brutal honesty which can be perceived as being angry all the time (as my wife, and grown daughter say), so should I put on a happy face for them also ?

[Gumby]

"People who are brutally honest get more satisfaction out of the brutality than out of the honesty." ~Richard J. Needham

[Lawrencewendall]

I really don't know how to answer. I'm almost always happy but have no idea how others see me nor do I care.

[bolt]

Predators primarily prey on the weak, its best to appear challenging, jmho?

[Amethyst]

That is exactly how my mentors at work expressed it to me. Only the term was "confident" or "assertive." "Challenging" would've been frowned on.

Quote:

Originally Posted by bolt Predators primarily prey on the weak, its best to appear challenging, jmho?

[TromboneAl]

I read that 10% of the population is on anti-depressants. It's 25% for middle-aged women.

[Gumby]

Over the course of my legal career, I deposed literally hundreds of people. One of my stock questions at the start of every deposition was "Are you taking any medications that would affect your ability to understand my questions and answer them truthfully?" However, I would usually only get to "Are you taking any medications . . ." before the deponent would start rattling off a list of them. The number of people who said they were taking antidepressants was truly staggering.

[triangle]

Somewhat tangential, but given TromboneAl's screen name and the topic this song is worth a listen.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eUw5_xOtvzQ

[Kroeran]

I would reframe unhappiness as a stress matrix.

There seem to be three categories of stress:

1) insults to our evolved genetic hardware and nature

2) mental level departures from our perception of a pragmatic, logical, sustainable path

3) insults to to our higher, creative, aesthetic, transpersonal, possibly eternal nature.

So, if I am having a bad moment, I interrogate myself regarding which level this negative stressor is coming from.

A big problem with FIRE is that we are creative, purposeful, experience, novelty, challenge dreaming and seeking creatures, so decadence and leisure drives most people nuts if they do not self motivate to feed those hungers the struggle for FIRE provided.

My gotos are, am I bored, am I lonely, am I doing enough for my widowed mother,

Scott Adams has been talking about happiness on his excellent podcast this week. His main strategy is to crowd out negative moods with intense activity.