Men of reddit, How has your idea of happiness and the ideal life changed since you were a teenager?

37 comments

  2. Flipped on it’s head. My life is nowhere near what I wanted when I was that age but I’m still happy. I learned that your happiness is up to you, not the world. I started looking for how best to enjoy my situation and tweak the things I didn’t like rather than looking for something perfect from the start, because I got bored with it quickly. I learned to enjoy the journey, not just the destination, and have road trips to prove that.

  3. Having a full time job is much harder than i could imagine and i can feel my happiness pouring out faster than it can be replenished.

  4. Not at all.

    Always wanted a house with big garden, wife, children and dog.

    Now that I have it I am completely happy.

  5. I completely rid myself of the illusions. Happiness is a temporary state that sometimes swings by but won’t ever turn into a constant state of being. “The ideal life” is just an overly burdensome standard that can never be attained, so I just got rid of it in my life. I just improve when I see a good opportunity to do so and with that the trajectory of life is upwards. What that looks like?, who knows but I’m not going to spoil it for myself by tainting that with romanticized delusions of perfection.

  6. I remember being 16 and thinking “no way I will grow old and stop partying and wrecking shit and being a rebel, you won’t catch me having an office job being someone’s slave or something”.

    You guessed it, I have an office job now (which I love) and I would sooner shoot myself in the foot than step into a club lmao

  7. I switched from wanting to be “Happy” to seeking contentment. They sound like the same but they definitely are not. Happiness is, by its sheer nature a short-lived, fleeing emotion.

    Contentment is longer lasting. I focus to seek contentment, which means going for different things than just wanting to be happy. Not to say being happy is bad, it is just not optimal when compared to the former. Doing this changed my expectations and made me focus on different things and aspects of how I run my life. It certainly has worked wonders for me.

  8. Kinda the same, but even more passive and realistic I guess? Funny, I use to be more of a optimist, but now the most that comes from that is me hoping for something, while having that thought at the door still saying, “But this is life, anything can happen.”…damn, I thought the same way then too, but it had light to it. Being almost 10 years outta high school though changed that though, to basically meaning any day is any day, and in this day and age, I wouldnt be surprised what comes, cause hope for anything better becomes a wasted effort. Do what you can instead in life, live how you feel, happiness is an emotion that comes and goes like the rest of them. Take them in when you can and appreciate them, good and bad. Cause numbness isn’t fun.

  9. Now I just want to be alone. And I don’t know if I could ever be happy

    I’m just running out the clock

  10. As a teenager I wanted more freedom, which meant living away from my parents. Now as an adult I’ve realised that there’s nothing more precious than being with someone who loves you. Living with my parents is where I found my ultimate happiness.

  12. As a teenager I dreamed of being rich and famous. Today I dream of being rich and absolutely anonymous.

  13. It hasn’t really changed for me but I picked a tough one to achieve or to maintain and I’m still learning how to go after it better and how to adjust my expectations of what it would be. I’ve always just wanted a lot of friendship and camaraderie in my life.

  14. Having a nice job, girlfriend, and car was the dream in my teens.

    Now the ideal life would be moving somewhere like Pitcairn Island and never leaving again for any reason.

  15. I play a lot less video games than I thought I would. The older I got, the more hobbies I picked up. The more hobbies, the less video games. And now that my kiddo can read, most of the Switch/TV time goes to him and my wife and I split the time after he goes to bed.

  16. Shit

    I had a plan, that went to shit thanks to covid

    I’m struggling now and unable to do what I want to do as a job cause I don’t have access to what I need

    Dating is more of a chore than anything and it’s difficult finding anyone that’s compatible or keeps the conversation going longer than 5 messaged

  17. When I was a teenager, my ideal life was basically: playing video-games all day. That was my end goal.

    For a long time during adulthood, it remained unchanged, but now, my ideal life would be one where I’d still have energy to keep running and doing hikes for as long as I can.

    I see people that are clearly over 60 years old running and I think to myself: “I want to be like that!”

  18. I used to think I wanted something like a gf or to get married. Never wanted kids though.

    Now I don’t want either of those things and firmly plan on remaining single for the rest of my life.

    Edit: typo

  19. I always thought about pursuing the ideal life of house, wife, kids by the time I was mid 20’s. I’m in my late twenties and have no money, no wife, kids and didn’t finish education beyond high school. Instead I became a skier and moved to the west coast to live out my dream.

    I have no money but I’m rich in life experience. I think I’m now much healthier and well more rounded as a person than I would be if I stayed home and followed the traditional life. In no rush for any of the things I wanted before, and I believe they will all come eventually. And who knows, maybe not but I enjoy my life immensely and am proud of myself to have lived and used my youth to experience life the way I wanted to.

  22. When I was a teenager I wanted to marry a supermodel. Now that I’m 22 I want to marry a woman that I like and one that likes me for me.

  25. When I was a teenager I believed that once I achieved a certain goal I will be happy and I expected things would work out without having to do any work myself.

    Now I recognize that I have to actively put the work in and change myself to achieve what I want and not stay so focused on the end goal. Am I truly happy where I’m at now? No, but that’s ok. I’m working on changing that and I’m finding happiness and enjoyment in the little things I get to experience every day. Life’s too short to wait to be happy and positivity will always be the driving force behind my discipline and hard work towards creating the life I want.

  26. Happiness isn’t a feeling, it’s a state of being. It’s a lack of unease, not pure unending bliss. Chasing that bliss is what I see cause so many people so much harm.

    The ideal life, I think, is difficult yet rewarding work with real impacts that I can see in the world around me, paid or unpaid.

  27. Teen: boy, school sure is dumb. Can’t wait to get home and play some video games.

    Adult: boy, school sure was dumb, I hope I have the energy to do basic chores, maybe I’ll treat myself to brand name essentials and a good shit as an expression of self care.

  28. When I was younger I thought that lots of casual sex was a big part of being happy as an adult. Maybe that’s true for an adult of, like, 25.

  29. I had a long list of things I wanted to accomplish, buy, etc., and as it started to be a possibility, I lost interest. Now, I have kids, and my interests are in making them the best person that they can be, and trying to set them up.

  30. I learned that happiness is different than Joy. Happiness is a choice you make every second of the day and joy makes it easier to make that decision. Joy perseveres through good and bad times and happiness is part of how you choose to deal with situations.

    The ideal life for me always stayed the same. Get married to hot girl, have kids with said hot girl, live long and prosper. I’m currently on part 2 of that journey. My wife and daughter are huge sources of joy and I’m just enjoying life while I have it.

    I don’t ever know how much time I have left on this earth and I can’t possibly predict how much time I have left with the ones I love so I spend every day without regrets and leaving everything on the field.

    It’s worked out so far for me

  31. I went from believe everything bad in my life was not only my fault but that I also deserved it. Today I know better than to be around folks what encourage such beliefs. The change was that I learned we all deserve some happiness.

  33. To be honest, my life feels pretty similar, even though I’ve moved out. I still get back to my hometown every weekend and mostly talk to people I’ve known since my adolescence. The only things that changed are how I see things and being more organized.

  34. When i was younger i just wanted to play in a band, be successful guitar player or a doctor, right now i just want a well paid job and someone to be happy that i’m coming home

  35. I just want a dog, man. I’ve come to learn that no one on this earth will ever care about me as much as a dog would. And do you know what? I’ll probably care about the dog more than I care about anyone on earth too

  36. I honestly don’t remember what I considered happiness as a teenager.

    But I’ve grown to realize how happy peace and quiet makes me

  37. Yes, I realized how much I hated working a job I loved when the pay wasnt great. I was privilaged and lucky enough to be able to change careers and very happy I did. The phrase “if you do what you love then you’ll never work a day in your life” set me back so far in life and Ive been playing catchup ever since.

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