What is the Purpose of Happiness?

Writing has a way of being therapeutic and offering solace to others who you just can’t always reach. In the wake of Junior Seau’s death, I am compelled to pen this. As a therapist who works with athletes, I am always reminded that they are people first and that is really what they do…they are people with human struggles! In church recently our pastor challenged us to really ask the right questions! Most time we ask people, “What do you do?” It seems so innocent but it feeds on our own insecurities about who we are and how we can but this new person in some type of box that our brain can process and handle. As the news will be reporting, Junior Seau had everything that the world thinks would bring you happiness. What people will eventually understand is that happiness is internal and breeds from within. Searching for it will leave you poor, desolate and angry! Truly in every situation, there is inherent good. How long will it take for others to realize that they are searching for something that is already within them and not the number of material things that one can amass? All of the sayings about the journey being the most rewarding are true. When I work with athletes about reaching and setting goals it truly is an exercise that provides a checklist for the journey! We all need those checks or the lifelong journey can become a little disheartening along the way. If you look at Junior Seau’s life and where his treasure was stored up it was in trying to help kids to find their passion and fulfill their goals!

Robert Price is a licensed psychotherapist in the Washington DC Metro area and owns a company, Elite Minds, LLC that focuses on providing therapeutic support to children and their families in addition to specializing in mental skills coaching and being a sports psychology consultant to many athletes on all levels. He can be reached at https://www.elitemindsllc.com.