Mastering Happiness, with Dr. Joel F. Wade

In today’s show, we’re interviewing Dr. Joel Wade, of Mastering Happiness.  Dr. Wade is an Author, Psychotherapist, and Life Coach who’s centered his work on happiness, and helping people live happier, better, and more effective lives.  And we’re talking about true happiness and well-being, not simply the happiness of feeling good in a lucky moment of pleasure.  Instead, happiness is a set of skills, a practice, and an attitude toward life that you can learn and apply in whatever circumstances you are in.

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Where Happiness Fits into the Cash Flow System

Here at The Money Advantage, we are a community of wealth creators who are entrepreneurially-minded business owners taking control of our lives and financial destiny. 

It’s not enough to just make a great income.  You have to figure out how to keep more, protect that money, and finally, increase and make more through the right investing decisions.

That’s why we have created the 3-step Business Owner’s Cash Flow System.  It’s your roadmap to take you from just surviving, to a life of significance, purpose, and financial freedom.

The first step is keeping more of the money you make by fixing money leaks, becoming more efficient and profitable.  Then, you’ll protect your money with insurance and legal protection, and Privatized Banking.  Finally, you’ll put your money to work, increasing your income with cash-flowing assets.

Today’s conversation will help you upgrade your mindset to be able to be a producer and creator of true life wealth, flourishing in every area of your life.

Who Is Dr. Joel Wade?

Joel F. Wade, Ph.D. is Marriage and Family Therapist and Life Coach, and the author of The Virtue of Happiness, and Mastering Happiness, and creator of an in-depth online course, A Master’s Course in Happiness, all drawing from the increasingly useful research in psychology in general, and positive psychology in particular; and his nearly four decades of working with people professionally. He has written regularly for a variety of publications, including The New Individualist, The Good Men Project, and the Beyond Wealth columns for the Oxford Club.

He’s also a world-class athlete, having won multiple national and world championships in water polo.

Dr. Wade enjoys teaching clear, practical skills and ideas that can be used immediately. He inspires his readers and listeners to take effective steps toward a more rewarding, joyful, and resilient life.

As a Life Coach, he works with people around the world and can be found at www.drjoelwade.com.

Joel Wade Conversation Highlights

What Is Happiness?

• Happiness doesn’t mean a temperament and personality of cheerfulness. Rather, happiness is Aristotle’s eudaimonia, which means success at being human.
• Martin Seligman moved psychology away from treating symptoms, to the habits for creating a flourishing, happy, successful life. He also created the original research on learned helplessness.
• When you focus on what you’re aiming for, the problems become smaller in comparison, and you have more resources to tackle the problems with.
• The difference between being happy about life, vs. being happy about your circumstances. You can’t base life’s happiness on circumstances, because there’s a lot of external luck to that. Happiness is more a matter of being happy about your life and living in a way that’s congruent with your value system.
• Don’t be too attached to the outcomes or the score. Instead, take control over your own focus, attention, skills, and playing my best.
• Carol Dweck’s work on a fixed mindset vs. a growth mindset. With a fixed mindset, you aren’t an agent in your own success, and challenges become risks and threats.  With a growth mindset, you celebrate challenges. 
• Overcoming challenges and failures makes success and happiness that much more valuable.  We need challenges that push us to expand and create more complexity in ourselves.

Happiness and Money

• You need a certain amount of money to be happy. Once your basic needs are met, the impact of more money on your happiness is much less. 
• What makes us most miserable is comparing what we have to what other people have. Envy causes us to see other people as things and impoverishes our sense of ability to create wealth.  Treating people as objects is the root of all evil.
• The way to be happy and create money starts with gratitude for the opportunities, skills, and blessings you have, and deliberately celebrating the success of others. 
• Money comes from creating value for other people, it’s not just stacks of paper or numbers on a screen.
• Collaboration creates abundance.
• Ideally, we get to make money by doing something we’re good at and enjoy. It doesn’t have to be a calling or a passion, just something we can get fully absorbed in, and that challenges us to grow.
• It’s important to appreciate where things come from. Money is a reflection of the value that we create, and all the products, services, stores, restaurants, technology, energy, comforts, necessities – all of it has been created by other people applying themselves to the task of creating value. Imagine your favorite store, your doctor, your electricity, your car… gone. That can be helpful to do from time to time to appreciate how much we have to be grateful to literally millions of other people.
• Investment and emotion don’t mix. When we make decisions out of fear, or anger, or worry, that tends to get us into trouble. We sell too soon, wait too long, or try and recoup losses quickly and irrationally. Instead, we should accept a loss and plan a clear strategy to rebuild.

Happiness and Entrepreneurship

• Fall in love with the value of work. Work can be play for adults.  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi says we’re in flow when we’re totally absorbed in what we’re doing.  That’s when we’re the happiest.  Absorption requires a challenge.  If it’s too easy, we lose focus.  But if it’s too hard, we get overwhelmed.  Flow allows us to focus our energy on honing certain skills and abilities.
• Maintain happiness in the midst of failure by recognizing emotions, accepting them, and moving through them by shifting into problem-solving.
• Entrepreneurs have to be ok with temporary failure, and be able to shift attention to solving new and different problems every day.
• Nathaniel Branden’s definition of self-esteem is the reputation you build with yourself.
• Gratitude for what we’ve overcome strengthens us by reminding us that “I am a person who has done this before.”
• When you’re facing something new, write a letter thanking your persistence that led you to overcome obstacles throughout your past.
• Create a business culture with principles based on tangible, concrete actions that you can choose to do, not vague, abstract ideals.
• Entrepreneurship is a creative act as complex as a symphony.

Find out More About Dr. Joel Wade

• Books by Dr. Joel Wade:
  • The Virtue of Happiness
  • Mastering Happiness
• Listen to The Mastering Happiness Podcast
• Check out, A Master’s Course in Happiness, his in-depth online course
• Learn more about his coaching and consulting for individuals, couples, and companies at www.drjoelwade.com

Get Financial Clarity Today

If you would like to implement Privatized Banking, cash flow strategies, or alternative investments, so you can accelerate time and money freedom, we can help.  We’ll review your situation to help you decide what moves are best for you.

To start the conversation, book a call with our advisor team.

Success leaves clues.  Model the successful few, not the crowd, and build a life and business you love.