I’ve been pondering this question for a couple of days: Which is more important, doing some particular thing or being happy? It seems like an easy question but the more I think about it the more complex it gets. The easy answer is to say, “both!” Do that particular thing AND be happy. That is always an option in theory but sometimes tough to do in practice.

Sometimes there are things that are just downright unpleasant to do but you know the discomfort of the task is temporary so you put off your happiness, suffer through it and get it done. Moving is a good example for me. It’s a pain, there are boxes and things everywhere, it’s a ton of work, most of it is no fun but after a few days and some suffering, it’s over.

The same is true with the last few hours of a really long drive. I’m tired, over-caffeinated, my back hurts and I just want to get home! I know that if I can just make through the next few hours I’ll be home and that thought makes it easier to get through the suffering and get the unpleasant task over with.

But what if the particular thing your doing isn’t something like moving or driving, both which are usually over in a relatively short period of time. What if the task is a decade long or life long project? Then which is more important, the task or the happiness?

Let’s say you are an inventor and stealing from every Econ course I ever took, you have an idea for a widget. (not the Apple computer Widgets but a nameless, unidentified product used as an example) And let’s say that you feel like this widget is a reflection of your personality, a piece of your soul, so to speak and you truly believe, in your heart of hearts that if people would be exposed to your widget (get your mind out of the gutter!) it would enhance and improve their lives. And while we are saying things, let’s also say that this widget is sort of a work in progress. It’s not a concrete item that you would produce once and be done with it. It’s something that you continue to develop, tweak, modify, pour your life into and hopefully improve upon. You have a widget that you can take and show people but you are constantly reinventing it and coming up with slightly different widgets hoping all the while that the constant improvement and reinvention will pay off.

For years you’ve dreamed about getting this widget to as many people as possible hoping that the widget will add massive value to their lives. For 15 years you’ve loaded up your car and driven thousands of miles with your widgets. You’ve traveled by airplane and by boat. You’ve sold widgets from the back of your car, you’ve sold widgets at trade shows, shopping malls, coffee shops, bookstores, bars and restaurants, colleges, festivals, you’ve sold widgets on the street in the baking sun, the pouring rain, the bitter cold all the while clinging to the belief that your widgets will enrich the lives of the masses.

When you first started dreaming of creating and selling widgets the dream was a dream of pure joy. You were ready for the challenge. No drive was too long, no challenge was too tough! You looked at the widget business with an attitude of fun. You knew there were no guarantees, everyone said the widget business was a tough business but you were undaunted. You had faith that it would work out and you looked forward to the process, the journey and you truly believed that even if you only sold one widget to one person and that person smiled and told you it changed their life, it would be worth everything you had poured into your dream. You dreamed the dream and chased the dream not only for what you thought could be a glorious end result, but for the fun you’d have along the way.

But as the years went by the miles started to add up. You found out that the widget business is a tough business. You’ve met many great people who care about you and really love your widgets but most people really don’t seem to care all that much. To make ends meet and to keep people happy you’ve had to sell other peoples’ widgets, widgets that maybe aren’t any better than yours but they’ve been around a long time. People know those widgets, they like the familiarity of widgets they know. When you are out selling widgets you hope people will ask for one of your widgets but often they don’t. They ask for the same tired old widgets that have been around forever, the same ones everyone else is selling. Especially that one f@#$%ing widget that people yell out every five minutes and think it’s the funniest damn thing in the world.

Each time someone tells you “no.” Your faith crumbles just a little bit. Each time there is a big widget event and no one invites you, your faith crumbles just a little bit more. Everyone told you that there would be a lot of rejection and heartbreak in the widget business but what no one told you is that if you’re not careful, each rejection and each heartbreak gets stored somewhere and you think about them, you relive them and each time you do so, the foundation of guts and heart you had when you started crumbles just a little bit more.

Slowly, almost imperceptibly, little by little over time, your focus and your attitude have changed. Everything else about your business has gotten better and better. Your widget making equipment has improved 100 fold as has your knowledge of that equipment. Your selling techniques have been honed over years and years of experience. Your widget business should be running at peak efficiency but the two most important assets seem to be damaged beyond repair. The only two pieces of equipment you had when you started your widget business, your heart and your mind, your most valuable equipment, is ruined.

A long time ago you forgot that you knew the widget business was full of challenges. You forgot that you got into the widget business not only with a dream of being a hugely successful widgeteer (that’s a person who makes and sells widgets) but also because of the journey and the lifestyle that go along with the widget business. Because you forget these things, the journey stopped being fun a long time ago. In fact, it hasn’t felt like a journey for years. It’s felt like the last few hours of a really long drive or those arduous final days of a cross country move. Only instead of lasting a few hours like the drive or a few days like the move, this has lasted for years.

Your whole thought process has changed. All you can think about is your lack of success in the widget business. Even when you have success you never see it as success. You could spend the bulk of your summer traveling to great spots, visiting with wonderful people all while selling widgets, something you are supposed to love doing!! And instead of enjoying that time and the journey you spend most of your time focused on why you aren’t selling more widgets, you wonder why some people seem to like other widgets better than yours. You take the rejections, the rudeness, the lack of camaraderie, the ambivalence, all the negative stuff personally and let it spoil any positive aspect of life as a wigeteer.

You’ve even put on what we’ll call a widget filter. You look at every aspect of your life through this widget filter. It affects not only your widget business but your self-esteem, your health, the way you treat friends, strangers and loved ones. Your widget business has become your entire life and you view it as being a failure and 1) you can’t get yourself to think of it any other way and 2) you have pretty much become hopeless about ever finding a way to fulfill your dream of becoming a successful widgeteer.

So if you are that wigeteer, which is more important, doing a particular something (your widget business) or being happy? Let’s just say for argument’s sake that as it stands now, it’s one or the other.

It’s an interesting question. At least it is to me.

More to come on this!

Matt

Here is Part 2