3 Happy Life Hacks Married Women Want Singles to Know

One day while putting some personal things in my cedar chest, I noticed the scrap book from my bridal shower.  At the shower, each of my friends were asked to write down their “best marriage advice”.  I took a moment and as I thumbed through the pages, re-reading what they wrote, three pieces of advice stood out.  They were really good pieces of advice. 

Hack #1 “Love him even if he doesn’t act the way you want him to.”

Why do we have a problem loving someone we feel like we should love or want to love.  Often it is because of, just what my friend wrote, they are not acting the way we want them to. 

Perhaps you have a person in your life you know you should love but struggle to love.  The problem is that whoever this person is in your life, they keep showing up as themselves and you want them to show up differently than they do.  You want them to be different than they are. The kicker is that as long as you want a different version of them to show up, you will always be disappointed.  You will never be able to love the real them because you are waiting to love them when the version you want shows up.  Do you see that?

The truth is, you can’t change other people.  You can influence them but not change them.  And waiting to love someone until they become what you expect them to be, is a long and unnecessary wait.  You can love them right now.  And love is one of the best feelings – so why delay feeling it.

Some of the best work that you can do to have a happier life is to allow people to be who they are and love them anyway.  If you want to make improvements in your happiness level when this person is around, I would suggest the following for you.  All you need is a pen, paper and some time.  Here is what you are going to do.

1.     At the top of the paper, write down the name of the person you want to change.

2.     Next, write IN DETAIL, a list of what it is that you want them to do.  Don’t be stingy, write it all down.  Every icky, uncomfortable, superior thought and idea you have.  All of it.

3.     Now, for each item on the list, write down WHY you want them to behave in this way.  Be specific.  Why do you want them to do what you want them to do.

4.     Then think about how you think you would FEEL if they did it your way.  Write down a feeling.  A feeling is one word.  If you have a tough time naming feelings, the 5 basics are: mad, bad, glad, sad and afraid.

5.     There are other steps to this work, but we will stop here for now.  What I want you to consider and ask yourself is, and this is important, do you want them to behave the way you want them to even if they don’t want to?   Why or why not?

In doing this work all the way through, I can testify that what you really want is for everyone in your life, all the adults, to be just who they want to be.  To show up in their interactions with you as themselves.  Not a watered down, pretend version of themselves.  What you really want is to be able to love them, even when they do not do it your way.  We think that we want it the other way.  But we don’t.  And it isn’t possible.  So, the work is for you to learn to love them just as they are.  And isn’t that what we are commanded to do? Love.  That is the 1st and 2nd great commandments.  To love.  Notice that nowhere in the Lord’s language is it conditional on the other humans doing life the way we think they should. 

And, the win is – you get to feel the feeling of love.  The best feeling ever.

Hack #2.  “Let It Go!”

What might you want to let go of?  A past hurt.  Perhaps you have been hurt by someone in your life.  A friend, a boyfriend, a husband, a neighbor, boss, child, church person, someone has hurt you.  Is that what you want to let go of?

Maybe it is something you have done.  Maybe you are struggling to let go of who you think you are…past mistakes you have made.  Past behaviors, ways of thinking, actions, words you said anything you feel regret for, feel guilt or shame around is worth letting go of. 

Maybe you can see that you need to let go of the negative self-talk that you easily slip into.  Are you ready to let go of the “pity-party” you keep holding for yourself? 

Are you ready to let go of postponing your life until you are thin enough, rich enough or smart enough to go after what you desire? 

Maybe it is anger that you want to let go of? 

In my experience what we want to let go of is either a thought (like those toxic negative self-talk thoughts), or a feeling (like the anger, hurt, sadness that have become the norm of our day-to-day life) or we want to let go of a habit (the habit of sitting in front of the tv each night eating chocolate or the habit of criticizing others or closing yourself off from others.)

Just like the periodic deep cleaning and purging that we do in the spring, it is so important that you clean out the junk drawer of your mind letting go of what is no longer serving you.  Letting go of the thoughts you are thinking, feelings you are feeling and actions you are and are not taking that are cluttering up your life.  That mind clutter is weighing you down, and making it harder and harder for you to live the life that you are meant to live. 

How do you do it? How do you let it go?  If you take the time to write it all down, all that you want to let go of, all that is holding you back from the thoughts you are thinking, to the feelings you feel and the actions you take, you will see what is in your junk drawer.  And then, very simplistically said, you can take a look at each one and decide what you want to put back in the drawer. 

You will then have in front of you a visual of what you want to let go of.  Awareness of what is in the junk drawer is the first step.  Sometimes, when it is all out, you can quickly and easily look at something and simply make a decision right then and there to let it go.  “Now that I see this in front of me, I can see how it is not serving me to keep this (thought, feeling or action) and am letting it go right now.” 

Hack #3 “When you are sure you are absolutely right,

consider that you might be wrong.”

Think about it.  How heavy and hard life is when the only option you have is to be the one who is never wrong.  To be the one who is right all the time.  Not only is it not true.  It is not possible.  Instead, when you are wondering if you are doing life right, you will want to allow yourself the room to do your best today, learn from what you did, and tomorrow do it a bit differently based on what you learned. 

The same is true for all the other humans that your life bumps into.  They too are learning something today, and hopefully will apply what they learned into their tomorrow and keep growing too.  But they may not.  Just like them, sometimes you will be better at it then other times.  You will learn and apply more quickly and with greater success.  And sometimes you won’t.  And that is okay. 

One of the most freeing things that I try to acknowledge in my own life is when I blow it.  Rather than beating myself up, I simply tell myself the truth “Yup, Sharon you kind of blew it that time.  That was not your best self just then.  And that is okay.  I love you.”  Allowing yourself to be wrong is the right thing, a healthy thing to do for yourself. 

Once you acknowledge and allow yourself the awareness that you didn’t show up the way you wanted to, you then have authority over yourself to make a change.  To repent, change, develop, learn and evolve into a better version of you…. line upon line, precept upon precept, here a little and there a little.  You allow yourself to become.  And that is what God wants us to do.  That is the purpose of our human experience.  To become, to change, to choose, to use our agency.  Listen, I get it.  If you have been stuck in perfectionism or pretending, it can be hard to allow yourself to be you – a flawed human who is worthy and valuable.  It isn’t one or the other – it is both – you are flawed AND worthy.

As I wrap this up, I am thinking about the word “hack”.  Hacks are by definition, clever tips, techniques or shortcuts that make life a little easier.  A true-life hack is simple and easy.  Based on that, I did not deliver 3 “hacks”.  They were not clever shortcuts or easy. 

But they are simple.  Simple if you allow yourself to be honest with yourself, opening your junk drawer and taking all the things out – the thoughts, feelings, and actions – so you can consciously choose what to keep and what to throw out.