Welcome to the happiness podcast. I'm Dr. Robert Puff. We talk a lot in this

podcast about how to be happy, but in this episode we're going to look at why we're

unhappy. What choices are we making that are causing us to remain

unhappy? It almost seems like a silly question. Why would anyone choose unhappiness? And I think

when they're choosing it, when they're doing certain things we're going to talk about the day that cause them to be unhappy, they're really not choosing it.

They're just choosing something that they think will cause happiness, but in the long run causes great unhappiness.

But what is that choice? What is the choice that we're making so often that leads to our unhappiness?

I want to share a personal story to illustrate this. I got through most of

high school and college pretty much avoiding being what you might call a partier.

I just wasn't that interested in it and I didn't do it. But when I went to Princeton

and started graduate school, I was at times a little overwhelmed by it. I may have done okay, but

it was quite a lot of work to keep up with those grades because I knew I

wanted to go on and get my PhD, so I had to do quite well in order to get into the next program.

The stress was really wearing me down and even though I was exercising and trying to take care of myself

Sometimes it just got overwhelming. So what I did which I think a lot of people do is I turn to something to help relieve the stress and unfortunately it really wasn't the best choice.

As I said thankfully I only did it a few times, but I did it and I learned from. And let me talk about what happened.

I, with my friends a few times, went out drinking and I came home, what I would describe

is quite drunk.

I didn't pass out, but I was definitely tipsy and had a lot of alcohol in my system.

Well what happened was when I got up in the morning I was sick.

I was really sick and after like I said the second or third time this happened, I remember saying, I'm done, I'm not doing this again.

And I pretty much was. That was probably the last time I ever drink like that ever again.

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