[nomagicbullet]

I very much liked this quote on choosing happiness:

> In the short term, you would be much happier if you accepted and admitted to yourself that the reason you don't have what you want is simply because you do not want it badly enough. The sooner you accept that, the happier you'll be. Then the next question is: Do you want to be happy or do you want to achieve what you want?

[herbertl]

"Desire’s a contract you make to be unhappy until you get what you want." https://nav.al/desire

[trogdor]

Am I missing something? The writer claims:

>The reason you don't have what you want is because you don't want it badly enough.

That is absurd. And I say that as someone who has nearly everything material I might want in life. Wanting something really, really badly doesn't ensure that you are going to get it.

Consider every failed startup. Those founders just didn't want it enough?

I don't get it, and I also don't get the second sentence:

>Then the next question is: Do you want to be happy or do you want to achieve what you want?

What if the thing you want to achieve is being happy? Why can't those be the same?

I feel like something is going way over my head here, but I'm not sure what it is.

[skulk]

I think the point is: if you truly want something, you'll get it or die trying. Being happy, then, is at some point accepting that you don't actually want the things you don't have yet.

[derbOac]

That advice — given in many forms by many people — to me almost seems immoral to at this point. It manages to pack so much into a brief assertion, that people who don't achieve something just don't want it badly enough. It's meaningless and insulting to everyone who finds themselves in circumstances beyond their control, in whatever ways that might be obvious or subtle to other people not in the situation. It blames victims, it enshrines survivorship bias, and it relies on a sort of nondisprovable assertion, which in itself speaks volumes about its validity.

Of course, the author adds the end bit, about "do you want to be happy or do you want to achieve what you want", which ameliorates it a bit and makes it more accurate. But by the same token it makes it softer and murkier and less useful.

Then again, the whole essay is predicated by "these are simply the lies I tell myself to keep on living my life in good faith". I can understand where that statement is coming from, but then what use is it?

I appreciate the desire to put advice into the world, but too often I find it completely useless out of context. Or maybe even actively harmful. They're like Barnum statements that can be interpreted in all sorts of ways in any given situation.

I guess I just feel like we as a society need to stop taking advice from people based on their own personal philosophies, which have all sorts of self-justifying biases (regardless of how their life goes).

[trogdor]

>Then again, the whole essay is predicated by "these are simply the lies I tell myself to keep on living my life in good faith".

I read the whole thing, and it seemed like the opposite of "the lies he tells himself."

Rather, it sounded like he was telling the truth as he sees it. I don't understand why he chose that title for his essay.

[jxnlco]

author here:

good liars deceive others great liars deceive themselves,

my goal was to call out that i do believe these are true, but i must acknowlege they are lies

[epistasis]

It's good to remember that even if it seems like you have figured things out, there is still a lot left to learn, or even completely overturn.

Calling these "lies" is a way to keep a beginners mind, which is a path towards greater knowledge and discovery.

[khaki54]

Self deprecating title to counterbalance life advice from a guy who is in his 20s

I'm not his target audience but I saw everything he wrote as true and wise

[hnfong]

There is some nuance to the assertion that if one doesn't get something they didn't want it enough.

But, as pointed out in another comment, the idea is that you either get it or die trying. As long as you haven't given up, there's a chance you'll get what you want.

A more socially acceptable "spin" is to emphasize on perseverance. But, at least in my belief system, it's not only the physical act of perseverance that eventually gets you there, but also the mental aspect of actually really wanting it.

There are also many other nuances like people thinking they want something but instead they want something else (eg. people thinking they want a Lamborghini, but maybe they just want to be respected). And then there are cases where people want something but at the same time kind of want the opposite thing (eg. want a high status challenging job, but also want to live a peaceful and chill life.)

So yeah, with such nuances it's probably not a great idea to just randomly throw these ideas out there without some detailed follow up explanations, that part I agree with you.

But what I disagree is the "victim" part. Nobody is a "victim" of not reaching a goal unless they choose to be one. I mean, let's say for example a person fails to pass an exam because they had to take care of their sick mother -- well, good for them, because taking care of their mother is more important than the stated goal of getting good grades for the exam. Nobody is a victim here. Instead, everyone's free choices are respected. As long as we don't judge people for their lack of apparent, socially-acceptable "successes".