How Happy Are You?

July 24, 2018 / in Personal / by Mic Johnson

Post written by Mic Johnson, talking about routinely asking yourself, and others, about happiness

Jeff Serven showed up at my house at 6:30 a.m. with the book “The Slight Edge” in his hands. We had talked about the book on one of our previous morning walks together.

Jeff said he loved the book and thought I’d enjoy it too. (I’m only three chapters in, but I definitely like what I’ve read so far.)

Now I normally take my morning walks alone, but when Jeff told me he’d like to join me, I was totally up for it. (If you want to join me sometime, shoot me a note at mic@bluegurus.com.)

It wasn’t just that I’d have someone to walk with that interested me about Jeff’s request.

It was the fact that when you’re walking 3-4 miles, you’ve got nothing but quality time to talk…REALLY talk…about things that matter and not just the small-surface-level-kind-of-talk.

I crave opportunities like this and, as I’ve gotten older and presumably wiser, the small talk is of less interest to me.

As we hit the final strides of our walk and had talked about all kinds of topics around life and business, I asked Jeff the question that inspired this post:

“On a scale of 1-10, how happy are you?”

Jeff answered the question openly and honestly. I could tell it really made him do a quick mental inventory of where he was at in his life.

I loved listening to his response, hearing the great things that bring happiness to his life, while at the same time highlighting those things he’s still working on.

Jeff then he turned the tables and asked the question of me. Ironically, it actually caught me a little off-guard. No one had ever asked that question of me before.

I shared my open and honest feelings with him about those things in my life that are bringing me joy and happiness…and those things that I’m still working on that would move my happiness needle a little bit further along.

It was a great way to spend the last few steps of our walk together. I appreciated his honesty, his vulnerability, and his desire to continue to work on improving himself.

As I contemplated our conversation on the way back to my house, I realized that I’m routinely asking myself, sometimes consciously and oftentimes unconsciously, how happy I am. I think it can be a healthy practice to do a regular “check in” with yourself from time to time.

It also reminded me of the importance of routinely scheduling awesome people and things in my life to make sure I’m doing my part to contribute to my own happiness.

Finally, in an odd twist of fate, as I was writing this post, I got a text message that said “Walkabout Wednesday or Friday?”

It was from Jeff.

The journey to happiness continues…