Articles

The 7 Myths of Happiness, Part 3

June 29, 2015 By Uncoveries

Warm sunshine. Bountiful smiles. Open laughter.

The popularized idea of happiness is free-spirited and effortless; it is less often associated with concentration, hard work or sacrifice. In addition to believing the myth of happiness is a must, we also have this idea that happiness is easy. There is often an odd sense of entitlement and lackadaisicalness that’s assumed with happiness. Many of us have an underlying belief that happiness is something that should exist without any effort on our part.

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The 7 Myths of Happiness, Part 2

June 22, 2015 By Uncoveries

Blame it on advertisements, TV shows or social media, but ultimately the responsibility is yours to detach yourself from the fairest of the myths of happiness.

Perhaps it’s the carefully airbrushed and crafted images of attractive, stylishly dressed celebrities in extravagant settings, giving off an impression of happiness and success, among other desirable aspects. Maybe it’s Instagram, Facebook and other social updates—the manicured snapshots of a second of someone’s life artificially representing a whole.

With these ideals of perfection flashing on multiple screens in your life, it’s reinforced repeatedly, “This is what happiness looks like.”

This leads us to the second of the myths of happiness series. In a capitalistic society where there are incentives to disempower and create insecurity in the masses, it’s hard to resist the tendency to misplace the emphasis on ideal conditions that you don’t have complete control over.

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The 7 Myths of Happiness, Part 1

June 9, 2015 By Uncoveries

Happiness doesn’t exist—not in the ways most people think of it.

There are many opinions of happiness out there, inaccurately portrayed by the media, advertisers, celebrities and other influential people and sources in our lives.

Big companies and marketers of all backgrounds prey upon these myths to get you to spend money in your continuous quest for the elusive state of happiness. The misleading epidemic is worsened by the masses of people who unknowingly fall prey and perpetuate the trend.

Of course there are true examples of happiness out there too. But most moments of happiness aren’t glamorous, big events.

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3 Surprising Benefits of Following Your Passion

June 3, 2015 By Uncoveries

No one said it was easy.

On the contrary, following your passion—whatever is meaningful to you—is likely to be more work than any job. In bringing a meaningful project to life, whether it is building a company, honing a masterpiece or writing a book, there will be many hours, days, weeks, or months, even years that pass before milestones are reached.

During the periods of nose-grinding persistence, there will be a general sense of never enough time, weariness from lack of sleep, wavering moments of doubt, fear from numerous unknown variables, multiple failures and tough lessons.

Yet, there are perks you can look forward to when you’re going through the ditches of meaningful hard work—perks that will keep you going when you would otherwise burn out and quit.

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How to Create Meaningful Progress in Your Life

May 26, 2015 By Uncoveries

In our American society of excess and not enough time, more and more of us are embracing how to create meaningful progress in life.

The greatest business leaders, entrepreneurs, inventors, moguls, authors and productive creators across all walks—they all learned the secret, one that takes practice and discipline throughout an entire life span.

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3 Steps to Bring Your Inspiration to Life

May 19, 2015 By Uncoveries

It’s not enough to start with the inspiration, although it’s farther than most people get.

It may be the first step to living the life you love, but nothing else happens if you stop there. If you’re not making progress towards doing what you love, here are the 3 steps to bring your inspiration to life.

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How to Live the Life You Love Starting Today

May 11, 2015 By Uncoveries

The determining question is this:

If you could make a comfortable and profitable living doing what you enjoy, is it what you’re doing now?

Put in other words, is what you’re doing now how you’d spend your time if you didn’t have to worry about earning money?

Waiting for the right time or perfect conditions to pursue what you’re truly passionate about is shortchanging yourself and the world. The someday plan, the aspiration you’re saving for years down the road or in retirement, what’s the real reason behind your postponement?

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Your Life Crisis Explained: It’s the Stage Not the Age

May 4, 2015 By Uncoveries

A movement is brewing.

Call it what you wish: quarter-life crisis, Millennial entitlement (although some disagree), boomerang or Peter Pan syndrome, but it’s real. In increasing numbers, young adults ranging in their early twenties to mid-thirties are realizing their lives are not what they want and taking steps towards the search. Gone are the days of blindly following the step-by-step, conventional path of the school system, college, and stable career with a company.

With the freedom of choice and paradoxically abundant and sparse options, many are feeling more conflicted than ever.

In the Great Recession, many of us struggled to find a decent paying full-time job after college, picking up service industry, part-time or whatever work we could find to pay the rent. For those who found full-time jobs right after college, we steadily worked our 9 to 5 (if we were lucky) or more hours depending on industry, field and business climate. In either scenario, a mass sense of dissatisfaction remained constant; a sense there must be more to life than making a paycheck and buying bigger, better and more things.

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