Is smart a criteria for happiness?
Not at all.
It’s your frustration tolerance.
This point rings true.
I think the meta-point is that it’s not about lowering your expectations about things. Instead it’s about improving your ability to deal with things that don’t go as planned.
Another way to put it is, raising your bar over what you choose to let frustrate you, goes a long way for your happiness.
In Feeling Good: The New Mood Therapy Revised and Updated, David Burns writes that it’s not your intelligence, but your frustration tolerance that’s the key.
Irritability Quotient (IQ) and Your Happiness
Raise your frustration tolerance.
Via Feeling Good:
“What’s your IQ? I’m not interested in knowing how smart you are because your intelligence has little, if anything, to do with your capacity for happiness.
What I want to know is what your Irritability Quotient is.
This refers to the amount of anger and annoyance you tend to absorb and harbor in your daily life.
If you have a particularly high IQ, it puts you at a great disadvantage because you overreact to frustrations and disappointments by creating feelings of resentment that blacken your disposition and make your life a joyless hassle.”
Key Take Aways
Here are my key take aways:
- Don’t lower your expectations. Happiness isn’t about lowering your expectations.
- Raise your frustration tolerance. Learn to roll with the punches. Improve your ability to deal with things when they don’t go as planned.
Who wants to live a joyless hassle?
Choose to raise your own Frustration Tolerance bar.
How To Deal With Criticism