You're going to be. Welcome to the happiness podcast. I'm Dr. Robert Puff. There's one part of life if you can master that I can't

absolutely guarantee you're going to be happy, but it definitely will help,

greatly help. What is it?

Well, let me start with the story.

When I was younger, I had finished my undergraduate degree in psychology

and I was going to go on and get my masters in comparative religion.

It was a very challenging time for me because I didn't know quite what I wanted to do at that point

yet.

I really love psychology and thought about becoming a psychologist, but I also really love to learn.

I love studying religions of the world, and I thought about being a professor. And because I kept changing my mind, I ended up applying to a variety of schools, some later than others, and I got into some, but others I was put on a list or didn't get into. In the end I decided to go to Arizona State University and I was very happy about my choice.

I wanted to go to some other schools, but ASU was an excellent school and I was excited to go there.

So my courses had been assigned.

I was going to be a TA or teaching assistant, so I was even given my own office and I had my name on the door and on

Monday I was going to start teaching and going to school at the same time. It was an

exciting time of my life because I finally had settled on what I wanted to do and everything was in place

including my name on a door. So on Thursday a few days before I'm going to start teaching

I get a call from Princeton and they say I know we

put you on a waiting list because you applied late but we now have an opening and

we'd really like you to come. Now mind you, ASU is a great program and I was excited to go there,

but Princeton was my first choice for studying world religions.

You can probably imagine the emotional turmoil I was in at that time.

But here's what I decided to do.

...