Why Reducing Unhappiness Isn’t the Same as Being Happy

Reducing unhappiness isn’t the same as being happy, and most people don’t know the difference. In this episode of Behind the Village, we explore why avoiding what makes you unhappy only gets you to neutral, not fulfilled.

This is the introduction to our next podcast theme on hobbies and passions, where we break down one of the most important insights about happiness: you can spend your whole life removing sources of unhappiness, clearing your plate, avoiding discomfort, but at a certain point, there’s nothing left to remove. You’re just neutral. Real happiness requires actively pursuing something. It requires caring deeply about things outside of work, building communities around what you love, and making space for the hobbies and passions that give you something you can’t get anywhere else.

You’ll hear us discuss why hobbies aren’t optional extras in a good life, how fear-based decisions keep you stuck, and why the people who light up when they talk about what they love are onto something essential. This episode sets the stage for conversations with people who’ve found belonging, purpose, and sometimes survival through the things they’re passionate about, even when it’s hard, even when it’s inconvenient.

Please note that this transcript was made using AI and it may not be entirely accurate.

00;00;03;06 – 00;00;06;16
Unknown
You’re listening to the Behind the Village podcast,

00;00;06;19 – 00;00;14;08
Unknown
Where we invite you to join us on a journey to understand how to live a life worth living.

00;00;14;11 – 00;00;31;22
Unknown
Now that we’ve concluded the topic of work life balance, one of the themes we picked up on while we’ve been chatting with our guests was the idea of happiness versus unhappiness, but we felt one aspect of that deserved a bit more conversation.

00;00;31;25 – 00;01;00;20
Unknown
I think that is one of the main things that nobody has really touched on so far in, in our conversations with other people, but is that idea of are you pursuing happiness or are you just trying to decrease how much unhappiness there is in your life? And those are very two very different things. And a lot of people kind of mix them together as one of the same.

00;01;00;26 – 00;01;33;11
Unknown
And I think we used to do it up until a few years ago or something, where we actually kind of discovered that scenario where reducing unhappiness is actually you would do different things to reduce unhappiness, and you would do different things to increase your happiness. So things like reducing unhappiness come from, you know, not wanting to do something, not wanting to go to an event because you may not know everybody or you don’t want to.

00;01;33;13 – 00;02;23;19
Unknown
Whatever it is, you don’t want to do these things. You’re trying to reduce the level of unhappiness that you have by taking things off your plate. It’s involving them. It’s almost like an avoidance of fear. Yeah, it’s a fear based decision. I feel like kind of I think I think you’re probably right in that it does come from a fear of not wanting to feel discomfort because I think a lot of people don’t do well with the feelings of discomfort, with uncertainty, with, you know, it’s a very real, and raw emotion that people aren’t used to feeling because so much of our world is kind of distracted with technology, social media, the internet, whatever.

00;02;23;23 – 00;02;59;02
Unknown
So much of our world is about distracting from actually thinking and feeling and understanding where you are. And what are you doing in this world, right? And that naturally leads to wanting to avoid unhappiness. And when you have happiness in your life, avoiding unhappiness feels very similar to increasing your happiness, because all of a sudden, look at how many things I’m doing that make me happy as an example, and look at all the things that I removed or let go or changed because they weren’t serving me.

00;02;59;05 – 00;03;28;04
Unknown
And there’s nothing wrong with that, right? There’s nothing wrong with removing unhappiness or reducing unhappiness. I think where a lot of the problem comes out is when people forget that they need to actually actively work on increasing their happiness. What is it that makes you happy? Go and pursue that. I think that’s one of the things that, at least I have sort of forgotten or I’ve never kind of realized.

00;03;28;06 – 00;03;51;18
Unknown
We’ve always kind of tried to reduce unhappiness as much as possible, try to come up with different ways or manners of solving the problem from a reductionist standpoint, as opposed to from a growth standpoint. And those are two very different things. So if I wanted to increase my happiness, well, then I need to do more things that make me happy.

00;03;51;20 – 00;04;24;25
Unknown
If all I’ve done, all I’ve ever done is reduce unhappiness. I keep essentially just taking things away and isolating myself, either from other people or from opportunities, or for things that I could have done for the sake of. I don’t want to feel that way and when you have reduced all the unhappiness that you can, at a certain point you won’t be able to reduce any more.

00;04;24;28 – 00;04;49;24
Unknown
And that’s when you kind of feel like, okay, well then what’s left and what’s left isn’t really much at all. It’s kind of neutral. If you were to think about it that way. Right. As opposed to actively introducing happiness in your life, you’re actively trying to pursue either friends or going out to whatever makes you happy, going hiking, if you like nature or any of these things.

00;04;49;24 – 00;05;05;04
Unknown
Right? That kind of aid in you feeling satisfaction and you feeling joy in your life. And those activities are completely different from each other.

00;05;05;06 – 00;05;17;15
Unknown
This concept of increasing happiness, and not just decreasing unhappiness, is exactly what led us to our next overarching topic of hobbies and passions.

00;05;17;18 – 00;05;44;13
Unknown
That’s why we’re calling it, hobbies and passions. Because a hobby really only happens when you really care about something. When you care deeply about something, right? Whether you want to create something or you’re doing something for fun, whatever that is. And when you have that level of care, you tend to put naturally more effort or more of yourself in there.

00;05;44;16 – 00;06;15;14
Unknown
And that provides its own level of satisfaction, right? So being able to understand the idea of hobbies in a deeper level, not just as, something that you can let go of, or put on whatever you want, but something that actually matters and something that should be part of everybody’s toolkit in life, if you will, no matter what it is, no matter what it is, it’s important because it’s going to give you something that you’re not getting somewhere else.

00;06;15;17 – 00;06;37;28
Unknown
Right? Yeah. And that’s what I love is just just for me. I love when people love stuff. And I could care less what the thing is, I don’t, you know, shun or Pooh Pooh other people’s hobbies or their passions or the things that they care so deeply about, even if it’s not my thing. I love the way people light up when they talk about those things.

00;06;37;28 – 00;07;00;09
Unknown
And I think it’s the cutest thing to watch somebody talk about their favorite thing, and the thing that they’re into and the thing they love and they spend time on. And, you know, it’s part of them. That’s my favorite. So that’s why this is an exciting topic for me. Yeah. And, you know, it comes hand-in-hand because I feel that same way, when it comes to work as well.

00;07;00;09 – 00;07;18;29
Unknown
Right. But the idea the people that actually enter into a field or enter into something that really enjoy what they’re doing, that really have they have that passion, it makes the hardships and makes everything that you have to go through feel more worth it. And for me, on the other side, when it comes to the life part, it’s also true.

00;07;19;02 – 00;07;44;08
Unknown
When you have that passion or that level of care, it makes going through it worth it. You want to be part of it. You want to, you know, be part of that community or that group that likes the same things as you. That’s essentially all we are as people is people looking for these pieces of community to fit into, based on what we enjoy doing.

00;07;44;10 – 00;08;10;13
Unknown
Like we love board games, we love reading. I know you love you read a lot. I used to read a lot, but it did. One time I read a book. I am a reader. I used to until I ran out of time. But yes. You know, we love listening to music and have record, you know, records around collecting records.

00;08;10;15 – 00;08;31;28
Unknown
And, you know, we love watching Formula One, which is just another thing. And it, it we’ve we’ve talked about this multiple times, but how we don’t know that many people that actually enjoy formula One right around here. So now as we started kind of meeting people and we find that this like subset of people that are also watched the same thing we do, we get all excited.

00;08;31;29 – 00;08;58;12
Unknown
You’re like, oh my God, we have somebody to talk about this I know thing. That’s the fun part of hobbies, right? And the great part about the idea of being able to have something outside of work that you can equally love, that you can equally enjoy, that is going to complement or match, you know, how much effort you put in in the work part, right?

00;08;58;12 – 00;09;21;24
Unknown
But is able to kind of offset and complement everything that you’re doing in life? Yeah. I also want to flag that, you know, it’s not always even though things are passions and hobbies, it’s not always sunshine and rainbows. You know, it’s a lot of time and effort and energy. Sometimes frustration put into the process of whatever these hobbies are, you know?

00;09;21;27 – 00;09;56;00
Unknown
So that’s also an interesting lens. It does give us things, positive things of fulfillment. But sometimes working through it is not always positive. No, but it’s the same as, you know, we might have mentioned it before, but we have this same mentality where nothing worth doing comes easy. Yeah, right. And. Hobbies and anything that you’re passionate about should be hard by default because you want to reach a certain level or you want to be a certain way.

00;09;56;03 – 00;10;35;01
Unknown
With these things that you love and care for. And they are going to be hard. It comes with that naturally. But wanting to go through them, I think, is what separates it, what makes it interesting and why. We are looking forward to listening to all the people that we have lined up for this next theme, if you will, because these are all people that have these, you know, hobbies or passions that they are, consistently kind of doing and deeply connected, deeply connected to it, regardless of the hardships or regardless of how, inconvenient it may seem at times.

00;10;35;01 – 00;10;57;12
Unknown
Right? But you do it because you love it, because you want to be a part of it. I think that’s really interesting. Like you said, it’s really, a very unique feeling to hear when someone is really excited about what they love. Right? And speaking about it. And they light up and they can’t stop talking about it. And it’s like, you know, that energy that they bring.

00;10;57;14 – 00;11;28;01
Unknown
That’s a wonderful feeling, right? That’s a great feeling to have and to share and to be a part of. And it’s also worth mentioning as well that these hobbies and these passions have also, in some cases, brought people through great challenge in their life, through some of the hardest times that people will ever go through, that some of the people we will be speaking to had these passions and these hobbies that helped lift them out of very difficult times.

00;11;28;03 – 00;11;51;09
Unknown
So hobbies and passions are not to be dismissed as, you know, things that are a nice to have. You know, they’re they’re very important, I think, in shaping who we are. Yeah. And also, like I said before, just finding the people that will be there, you know, that you’ll find friends through it. You find people that will care for you.

00;11;51;09 – 00;12;17;06
Unknown
You find people that you hang out with. You find this community that can help you through good times, bad times. It doesn’t matter, right? But it it’s part of finding belonging. So yeah. So I’m really looking forward to, the next theme and we’re going to be starting to explore just different hobbies and passions with different people. And I’m excited to listen to everything they have to say.

00;12;17;09 – 00;12;21;08
Unknown
Me too.

00;12;21;11 – 00;12;40;28
Unknown
Thank you for listening to the entire episode. All the links and info you heard in this conversation will be featured in the show notes on our website. If you’d like to know more about anything we mentioned in this episode, make sure to check Villager Magazine Talks Podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you’re listening from.

00;12;41;00 – 00;12;49;22
Unknown
If you’d like to help this podcast grow, consider subscribing to our podcast channels like YouTube or Spotify so you never miss an episode. Thanks again and I’ll see you next time.