I’ve been fascinated by how prevalent our idea of happiness surrounds the concept that in order to appear successful in life, you must have a certain set of practical pursuits. Things such as:
- You should get good grades
- You should go to this Ivy League school
- You should get a degree in engineering, medicine, or computer science
- You should live in this state, in this city
- You should take this kind of job and then climb this corporate ladder
- You should purchase this kind of home, in this kind of neighborhood
When we arrive at these milestones we often find ourselves being rewarded with some token of success; a diploma, a scholarship, a degree, a promotion, a raise, a good credit score. These are our faux trophy assets that are supposed to show our level of success and reflect our happiness in life, but instead they are nothing more than participation awards.
They are sold to us as building blocks to having a happy life. But they are faux building blocks. It’s not pursuing authentic or real happiness. Instead, they are the pleather of happiness. It’s not real happiness, it’s synthetic happiness.
It simply has the appearance of happiness. Underneath that pleather of happiness is insurmountable unhappiness, debt, stress, and unhealthy responsibility to someone else’s agenda and life they want you to live.
We continue living and relying on our faux success by entering the “Keeping up with the Jones’s” lifestyle. This is done by purchasing other faux trophy assets. We qualify for more debt and purchase houses and cars we can’t afford. We go on vacations using credit cards.
We buy trinkets of success and other things that give us the appearance of having a happy life. We parade around with our $1000 purse, appearing and feeling successful, when we don’t have a $1000 to put in that purse.
All the while underneath the facade is a person screaming, “Notice me! Look at me! I’m important! I’m somebody!”
Living this way isn’t working. If you take a deeper look underneath the facade, you’ll hear the real person saying, “This isn’t me.” A lot has gone wrong with the pursuit of faux trophy assets, in a world that is shifting into passion and creativity this kind of “practicality” doesn’t work.
When you are pursuing someone else’s dreams of happiness for you, you aren’t living your dreams or finding your happiness. When you settle for a job or a life you have no passion for, you end up with a life of mediocrity that you have participation awards for. Living this way is an epidemic in this world. It’s dangerous to democracy and it allows tyranny to continue. Let me explain…
When you’re willing to live in this kind of compromise, you not only give away the authentic opportunity you have to live an extraordinary life, but you give away subtle things as well, things like health, quality of life, and the pursuit of real happiness.
You grow more unhealthy responsibility and that puts unnecessary stress on you. You grow a sense or feeling of helplessness and stuckness. You become addicted to living in this vicious cycle and it robs you of your future.
When we live a life of relying on faux trophy assets, we are trained to become a follower. Following the rules of success as though they are outlined in predictable steps, as if we were robots doesn’t work.
We don’t actually have to think for ourselves. We don’t question or use discernment. We don’t have to ask ourselves what we want. We simply follow a prescribed path or set of directions that are supposed to be beneficial to our well-being.
When you live like this, you die without knowing who you actually are and what you actually want. This is living as “The Walking Dead”. Happiness is something we pursue. It allows us to dream, visualize and ask ourselves what we want to pursue. Breaking the cycle of inauthentic living means that you will benefit most by creating a smart life.
When you create a smart life, you understand the difference between following the rules and knowing when to break the rules. It’s knowing how to bridge yourself from where you are now to where you actually want to be. It’s getting to know you in a deep way. It gives you the ability to evaluate what it is that you actually want, where you want to live, what’s important to you, and what success looks like for you.
To live a smart life means not engaging in unhealthy responsibilities that have nothing to do with you. It’s moving away from a life where you feel stuck and hopeless and moving into a life that ignites the best parts of you and helps you enjoy the journey.
The danger in relying on faux trophy assets and blindly accepting what other people tell you, is that you are forced to accept some preconceived or preordained level of happiness, which is living a life of consistent rules and struggles that don’t benefit your dreams.
For me, I remember the feeling I got when I received a participation award, not realizing it was a faux trophy. It gave me a false sense of self-esteem. I started pursuing other people’s agendas because the pat on the back felt so good. What I realized from experiencing this was that my self-esteem wasn’t as great as I thought it was.
My transformation came when I realized that my authentic self-esteem would help me unfold my happiness. When you have genuine, authentic self-esteem, it’s because you’ve gotten to know you in a way that you respect. You value you more than all those faux trophy assets you’ve been collecting all your life.
Success isn’t a place you go to. It’s not somewhere you arrive at. It’s a state of being you live by, that surrounds what’s important to you and living the life of your dreams. The truth is, your life and success get real, when you get real.
Vickie Helm is a bestselling author, business and asset strategist, and the CEO of Smart Group Firm. She has improved the success of more than a thousand companies and the lives of thousands of individuals throughout her career. You can learn more about Vickie at https://thesmartlifeclub.com or https://vickiehelm.com.