Smell the Roses with Issy Burch

They don’t teach you how to find happiness in school. Thankfully Matt O’Neill’s mother, Issy Burch, taught him lessons on happiness from an early age. When we’re young, we tend to brush off our parents' advice, only to find out later that their words had profound wisdom.

In this episode, Matt and his Mom discuss the greatest lessons they learned growing up. You’ll be grateful to hear this wisdom, and you may just decide to call your mom and tell her how much you love her after you hear this show.

Here are some power takeaways from today’s conversation:

• Balance hard work and self-care
• Happiness comes from within
• If you believe in yourself, you can be anything you want
• Practice moderation in everything you do
• Always choose joy

[03:41] Take Time to Smell the Roses

While it’s important to do your best in everything, it’s just as important to take care of yourself. Taking time to smell the roses is about finding the balance between giving 100% of yourself to whatever you’re doing and self-care. That’s how you can be your best self.

[07:45] Practice Honesty and Integrity

If you remain honest and truthful while living your best life, God will know. And being true to yourself will help fill your happiness tank, which will lead to good moods. Treat people the way you want to be treated. Have grace and compassion even for those who are unkind to you.

[12:34] Money Doesn’t Buy Happiness

Happiness comes from the inside. Unless you can find your joy, you’ll always be unhappy. You can go out and create wealth, but don’t rely on money to be happy. Do not idolize money and worldly successes. Do not lose your joy.

[17:48] Believe in Yourself

You can do and be anything you want as long as you work hard and put in the effort. Set realistic goals and believe in yourself. If you don’t put yourself out there, you’re never going to achieve anything.

[22:48] Do Everything in Moderation

Strike a balance between working hard and taking care of yourself. Don’t deprive yourself of things that you want. Instead, give yourself and do everything in moderation.

[24:42] Always Choose Joy

You can’t choose what happens to you, but you can always choose how you react. How you respond to situations and present yourself is so important. Sometimes choosing joy can be hard. Just have faith that things will get better and find a reason to be happy and grateful. It’s also important to let yourself be sad. Don’t be too hard on yourself. Understand what’s making you sad. Connect with nature to help you relax and be happy again. Remember to love and accept yourself.

[35:25] Share a Smile

Sometimes, just smiling at someone or being kind can make a person’s day. Try going out of your way to smile and greet the people you encounter — it could make your day, too!

Notable Quotes:

[26:21] — [26:35] “We still can make a choice to choose our reaction, to choose our attitude, to choose the state, to choose the way that we’ll show up, to choose the emotions that will show up to handle that situation.” - Matt

[34:37] — [34:46] “Standing on the edge of the beach and looking at the vastness of this ocean… I mean, that’ll give you some perspective that ‘Man, this world is so much bigger than my little preferences.’” - Matt

Links to Resources:

THE GOOD MOOD SHOW Podcast on Apple, Google, Spotify, Anchor, and more…