On Deserve

"You deserve happiness" seems empowering, right? What if it is really the opposite? "Deserve" assumes a universal rule, such as declared by God, law, or "everyone agrees"?

A common use of "deserve" that may not serve us: "I deserve to be happy."

This would serve a person better if reworded with empowering phrases like, "I want to be happy," "I can be happy," "I intend to be happy," "I choose to be happy," and "I will be happy."

When one says, "I deserve to be happy," one is abrogating responsibility. It begs the questions, "Says who?" and "Who is going to give this to you?"

We all have a choice to be happy. We do not "have to" do anything. Everything we do is a choice. Sometimes neither choice is to our liking. Yet we still choose. "Should" is another deserve-mentality word that makes erroneous assumptions about responsibility and reality.

Here is what Stephen Covey, said about "deserve" in his book 7 Habits of Highly Effective People:

A man once told Dr. Covey that he was no longer "in love" with his wife and asked what to do.

Dr. Covey responded "Love her".

The man said that he no longer felt love.

Dr. Covey explained that love is a verb, not a noun.

Waiting and hoping for love to bestow itself upon us and wondering why it never does is no different than believing we deserve to be happy and wondering why happiness never arrives.

People have far more control over their happiness than they realize.

More on deserve: A statement combining a moralistic judgement and deserve thinking is typical in our present retributive justice system: "He did something wrong and deserves to be punished," in contrast to restorative justice. Domination systems believe that the people in positions of judgement, power, and authority have the right to punish or hurt others because they believe they "deserve" it, but really, it is just their way of using their positions of power and authority for their own benefit.

from the article at https://ClearSay.net/language_that_denies_choice.asp