The Art of Happiness

In Randall’s case, his depression lifted ratherquickly as we focused on his pain and feelings ofloss, and he was able to fully confront andexperience his grief. Sometimes, however, ourunconscious strategies to avoid facing ourproblems are more deep-seated—deeplyingrained coping mechanisms that can becomeembedded in our personality and are hard toextract. Most of us know a friend, acquaintance,or family member, for example, who avoidsproblems by projecting onto others and blamingthem—accusing others of having faults that, infact, are his or her own. This certainly isn’t aneffective method of eliminating problems,however, and many of these individuals arecondemned to a lifetime of unhappiness as longas they continue in that pattern.