Focus on the process rather than the outcome

To be happier, it is better to focus on the process, on the path, rather than on the result.

As Confucius said, "All humans think that happiness is at the top of the mountain, when it lies in the way of climbing it."

Setting goals is important. But when you start doing things like creating a startup or playing sports, if you wait to reach the best possible results to be happy, knowing that there is only a 10% chance of succeeding in creating a startup and that sports stars have an unusual genetics or even use doping products, you take the risk of never being satisfied, of never being happy.

Whereas if you focus your attention on enjoying the process, on doing things you find meaningful, on implementing the right methods, on learning and progressing, there is potentially a 100% chance of being happy, since no matter what the result is, you will appreciate the path you are taking.

And, what is more, when you enjoy the path, there is more chance to succeed.

This is from a perspective with a high level of focus on happiness. From other perspectives, results are very important:. to get good grades and pass to the next year, to know if your company can survive another day if you are an entrepreneur, to adapt your training if you are an athlete and in many other cases. When performance matters, there is a right balance to find in our focus for optimizing the performance-happiness equilibrium.