Wanting to Be Happier in Your Life? Embrace Hardship.

There is an opportunity for wisdom and growth in suffering.

You've probably heard of the comfort zone. It's a zone in which you have everything under control. In this zone, there are no surprises. No good surprises, no bad surprises.

You know exactly what to expect. This can be reassuring because you avoid having to face the unknown. You avoid having to put yourself in danger in situations where you don't know the ins and outs.

At first sight, it is in this comfort zone that you will be able to find happiness in your life. A peaceful and safe life.

And then, by dint of evolving in your comfort zone, you will end up getting bored. And yes, no surprises, no difficulties, nothing but things that you master perfectly. You will get bored and you will start to feel that you are not moving forward in your life.

Your initial feeling of happiness will fade and give way to a more complex inner question: how can I move forward in life? Why am I not happy when I am in a situation that I am perfectly in control of?

The problem comes from the fact that you are used to never trying something new. Human beings are not made to stay constantly in their comfort zone. You have to look beyond it every once in a while to stay alert. That's how you can be truly happy.

I am not telling you to constantly look beyond what you know, but to do it frequently.

More and more scientific research is proving that when a challenge comes your way, taking it on will make you happier in the long run, whether you succeed or fail. This may seem paradoxical to those who are afraid of failure. But the simple fact of accepting the challenge rather than running away from it by wanting to stay in your comfort zone will put you in a category of your own: the people who move forward in life.

This willingness will make all the difference in your outlook on life.

An ancient Chinese saying describes the idea that embracing difficulty rather than running from it makes all the difference:

“Chi Ku Shi Fu”

What? You don't speak Chinese? Well, neither do I and in English, it goes like this:

“Eating bitterness is good fortune”

The idea here is that suffering is an opportunity for wisdom and growth. Difficult situations can and will bring you a lot in life if you choose to face them rather than avoid them.

This is called leaving your comfort zone to reach an unknown, less reassuring, but more rewarding zone: the growth zone. In this zone, everything is unknown to you, but everything is possible as long as you are motivated to take on the new challenges that come your way.

While you don't have control over the situations that come your way, we do have control over how we react. Pursuing happiness is clearly about meeting those challenges by embracing the difficulty. While not necessarily doing it every day, doing it as often as possible will give you an unparalleled sense of well-being by providing you with new perspectives and wisdom from the experiences you have had.

You know what you have to do to be happy in your life. It's up to you!