You can be grateful and unfulfilled at the same time...
Recently in a conversation with a client, I observed that she seems to be putting a cap on her happiness – i.e., she is limiting how happy she believes she can be in certain areas of her life. She remarked that my observation felt true, and yet at the same time she felt confused, because she has a good life and is grateful for where she is now. This client has done a lot of work. She has grown a lot, and her life looks significantly different than it did a few years ago, so it makes sense that she feels grateful and proud of where she is now.
As we explored this more, what was revealed was a very subtle story about needing to be grateful and about what it would mean about her if she admitted that she didn’t feel fulfilled.
This conversation with my client also reminded me of a conversation I had a few years ago with another client. The client shared how frustrating her work was, how challenging her marriage was, and how she regrets moving to a different country. She longed to move back to her home country, but feared that it would disrupt her family’s life. In that conversation, I observed that it sounded like she was unhappy. The client got very angry and defensive. I remember feeling confused at the time, unsure of what had sparked such a strong reaction. Of course, now, years later, I get it, and I will elaborate soon…
Today, I want to explore the distinction between happiness and fulfillment, and how it relates to contentment.
Happiness vs. Fulfillment
If I asked you: Are you happy? What would your response be in this moment? And what criteria would you use to determine your level of happiness in this moment?
See, happiness is an emotion and therefore is fleeting. It shifts. I can be happy in this moment because I could be playing around with my kids, or laughing at a joke a friend is telling me. I could be chatting with a loved one, or reading a book on the couch. I could be swimming in the ocean or watching a sunset, and these things would certainly make me happy in the moment, if I were fully present to them. They would make me feel good.
I could also be unhappy in this moment, because my car broke down, or the house is a mess, or a prospective client said no, or my kids are fighting and I’m feeling overwhelmed with the chaos around me. From moment to moment if you were asked this question, your answer would change, because it would depend on what is happening right now, and – more importantly – what you are telling yourself about what is happening right now.
Interestingly, I might also feel happy even when the kids are fighting and the house is a mess. Those things don’t need to make me feel unhappy, because it’s never the thing on the outside that is occurring. It’s the story I tell myself about it. If I relate to the mess as a bad thing, or as something that I’m going to have to clean up, that might make me feel unhappy – frustrated and angry even. However, if I relate to the mess as signs of joy and playfulness in and around the house, and as signs of healthy children mucking about during their Summer holidays, I might feel different in that moment. I might feel joy and gratitude, instead of anger and frustration.
My friend might be telling me a really funny joke, and I might be stuck in my head thinking about a conflict I had or about what I need to get done the next day, and then I would not be present enough to hear the joke, and have it change my state.
My point is happiness is fleeting, and changes depending on my level of presence and my thinking about what is occurring. In other words, I can think myself happy or unhappy, depending on the story I choose to tell about what is happening.
Fulfillment is a higher cognitive state. What this means is that it’s not a basic emotion like happiness. It can last longer and is often based on a mindset. According to the dictionary, unfulfilled describes “a promise, goal, or personal state that is unmet, incomplete, or lacking satisfaction. It most commonly refers to unachieved dreams, unsatisfied needs, or a person feeling unhappy with their current life progress.”
It’s the general sense of wellbeing or unwellness I experience when I think of the bigger picture of my life. Like my client, I might be so grateful for where I am now, and still feel unsatisfied with my progress, because I might still feel like something is lacking or missing. I might still have secret dreams and longings that I have not realized.
This is what my client kept saying too. She kept saying, “I feel like there is more.” And like I shared a few months ago, when I asked the question: “What is driving your desire for more?”, there are two kinds of desire for more…
There is the kind that comes from needing to create a false sense of security and safety driven by the belief that I’m not enough. It’s driven by an inner emptiness and fear. It’s driven by a scarcity mindset and the constant need for forward momentum. It’s connected to the false belief that forward momentum equals meaning and purpose. And it’s often driven by a desire to be happy.
This insatiable need or hunger for this kind of more can be embedded in the false belief that the point of life is to be happy. Happiness is not the point of life, because it’s simply unsustainable in a world that ebbs and flows constantly. Happiness is not a destination we arrive at. There is not destination called Happiness.
Alternatively, there is the desire for more that comes from being fully alive. It’s a longing for continued growth, expansion, and opportunities for self-expression and contribution. It’s a desire that is driven by gratitude and groundedness, the kind of aliveness that can only come from healing.
Note: It’s desire that is driven by gratitude. It’s not separate from gratitude. It’s not an indication that you are ungrateful. It stems from the deep sense of joy that comes from feeling more alive, and living in alignment with who you truly are and what matters most. This second kind of desire for more, is the longing for fulfillment, and it’s your birthright. You are meant to grow, evolve, change, and create what your soul most longs to create in this lifetime.
This is the deep ache my client is feeling – a longing for continued expansion, that actually stems from the gratitude she is experiencing in her life right now for all that she has overcome and created. It’s not an indication that she is ungrateful. So, in a beautiful way, feeling unfulfilled, means your soul is longing for even greater expression. Feeling unfulfilled is a way your soul is letting you know that there is more available to you, and that you have only just begun.
What can stop us in our tracks and prevent us from heeding this call from our soul, is the false story that feeling unfulfilled somehow means that we are ungrateful. I’ve shared with you before that guilt is not a feeling. Guilt actually blocks us from feeling what’s really true for us.
Running a conditioned story that wanting more means we are ungrateful, or that we should simply be grateful, can evoke a sense of guilt that blocks us from hearing the call of our soul, and the direction it wants us to go into next. It’s a way that we can spin our wheels and stay stuck in a life that is “good”, but not truly fulfilling.
Fulfillment leads to Contentment
And interestingly enough, true fulfillment leads to contentment, defined by the dictionary as “a peaceful state of mind defined by happiness, satisfaction, and inner ease with your current life situation.”
I want to even disagree with this definition and offer that contentment isn’t always defined by happiness. It can be, and sometimes there is pain, struggle, heartbreak and frustration, and yet, if asked if I would go through the experience again, my answer would be 100% YES! Contentment is a sense that you are aligned with what truly matters for you; even if right now, it feels hard or challenging. It’s what the women in THRIVE are seeking.
These women have spent years of their lives striving for the first kind of more – i.e., the more that would make them feel safe, secure, confident, and at peace. They know in their bones what it feels like to look successful on the outside, and feel unfulfilled on the inside. They know what a toll it takes to be out of alignment with their soul’s calling.
That’s why they said yes to THRIVE, so they could discover the second kind of more – the longing for true fulfilment and alignment that can only come from listening to our own truth, underneath all the conditioned stories. And when we are in it, it can sometimes feel hard, but we would never want to go back to the way things were, because we sense deeply that we are moving in the right direction. Not the direction others want for us. The direction we feel pulled towards from the inside.