Conditional well-being sounds like this:

I’ll be happy when I lose weight.

I’ll be safe when I buy a new home.

I’ll be happy when I find my soul mate.

I’ll be peaceful when I do yoga regularly.

I’ll be secure when I get a promotion at work.

Chances are that at some point in your life, you fell into this trap. The trap that some external circumstances need to be true in order for you to feel in a certain way.

Why is this happening?

You were born peaceful and balanced and trusting our intuition. And then your parents, the extended family and the society taught you to look from the outside in, to see yourself and decide your value through the measure of others. You were conditioned to believe that you need to get somewhere else than where you are, that there is always a “there” in the future that is better than the “here” in the now. That there is always something in the future worth pursuing at the expense of your well-being in the present moment. That if you chase that something “there”, you’d be rewarded with happiness, joy or other core well-being emotions.

So, you learned early on this conditioning:

I’ll be [happy/peaceful/safe/secure/fulfilled/ok] when I [do/have/get/earn something].

If you look at this mental model from a holistic perspective, it is a conditioned pattern of thought that says:

I’ll be [core internal state] when I [external circumstance]

This implies that circumstances cause your internal well-being state. That what is happening in the outside world determines your state and is the measure of your happiness, safety, security, fulfillment, peace.

Please pause now for a moment and ponder on this question:

What from the outside world can you fully control?

You can influence the course of some events, but definitely you can’t fully control anything outside of yourself. The “I’ll be … when…” mental model makes you dependent on the external circumstances. It leads you to feeling powerless, hopeless and overwhelmed. It also creates the expectation that when the circumstances will become true, you’ll feel happy, joyful, content – only to realize later on that even if those emotions show up, they don’t last for long.

Repeated over time, this “I’ll be… when…” pattern of thought:

– disconnects you from your true inner values

– makes you pursue doing, getting, earning – in attempt to feel better and

– it makes you feel hopeless and depressed when you realize that doing, getting, earning may be fulfilling short-term but do not guarantee you long-term emotional well-being.

The worse situation you can get into is the one when you realize that the external circumstances became true but you did not feel the way you expected to feel (the new partner did not make you happy, the salary raise did not make you feel safe, the new home did not bring you security, losing weight did not bring you fulfillment etc.).

“I’ll be happy when…” is a trap.

So, is there anything you can do about it?

Here are 2 simple steps you can follow:

1. Stop using the “I’ll… when…” pattern of thought. Become aware of it and remove it from your mind completely. It’s not bringing you any benefits.
2. Work consistently to replace it with “I am … now”. In other words, decide that the present moment is the most important for you and commit to your well-being, here and now. Focus on living each moment to the best of your abilities. Fall in love with yourself. Develop a long-term, committed, nurturing relationship with your own being. Learn what you like, what you don’t like, what makes you happy, what brings you joy, what your values are, what you really believe in – learn everything about yourself. Set your boundaries and communicate them clearly. This change takes time and effort, but you’ll build a strong core internal state for a lifetime – an internal state that does not depend on external circumstances and is paramount for your emotional well-being.

“If you are able to make yourself just the way you want yourself to be, you can also create your life the way you want. As most of the time it is your own thoughts, ideas, philosophies, ideologies and emotions which are impediments to creating the life the way you want.” -Sadhguru

Well-being is for every present moment