Welcome to the happiness podcast. I'm Dr. Robert Puff. I don't know if this ever happened to you, but when I was in high school, I was playing football with some friends of mine just in a local park. And as I was going out for a long

past during one of the plays, but unfortunately I wasn't quite ready to catch it, but

it was ready to hit me and it hit me square in the stomach and wham I was completely out of breath.

I couldn't breathe and I was humped over.

I just couldn't move for a few minutes.

And of course my breath came back and we continued to play. I wasn't upset. I wasn't mad at anyone.

I hadn't caught the ball correctly. It knocked the wind out of me.

And we just kept on playing. It seemed so simple, so innocent. But then why may I ask you, does this happen?

A while later I was playing for my local team at high school and we were playing a rival team and during the game

as I was running down to go get the quarterback another player punched me right in the stomach

and I was knocked over, lost my breath and wasn't able to make the

tackle.

And at that point I had a choice to make.

I could have, like in the first instance, let it go and continue to play, or I could have created a story

and made it quite upsetting for myself and maybe even for those around me.

Thankfully, my father, who had played football in college and high school told me to just keep

on playing it's part of the game and don't worry about it, which I did, I let it go.

So how is this relevant to our happiness? How does me getting hit in the stomach

having the breath knocked out of me relate to our happiness? It's actually quite

simple. Sometimes in life this is going to happen. We're going to have that

breath knocked right out of us and it can be quite challenging for a moment or two.

And then we have a choice to make. We can choose to let it go, move forward, and enjoy

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