#152 - Standards vs. Ideals | Carina Cunningham

Gretchen Rubin’s #1 New York Times Bestselling book, The Happiness Project, started with a question that she asked herself: 

“What do I want from life, anyway? I want to be happy.”

We may have asked ourselves the same question at least a dozen times in our lives, often with different answers. But one factor that we can attribute to the absence of happiness is when our standards are disconnected or unaligned with our ideals.

To achieve a life of peace, joy, integrity, and clarity, it is important to distinguish and delineate between standards and ideals while also understanding how one feeds into the other.

When we are unable to distinguish between the two, we feel stressed and pressured to live a life that is not authentic to us. Think about it: do your standards reflect the person that you want to be in those areas that you'd be proud of being? Are your standards taking you closer to your ideals to live a life of harmony? If not, why are you settling? And how are you settling? What do you need to do to adjust your standards? 

In the realm of relationships and marriage, always remember that sexual integrity is an active, lifelong pursuit of being in line with your ideals. Even into marriage, into old age, there's always work to be done.

Listen to Episode 152 to learn more!

What’s the difference between a standard and ideal? [4:09] When is it worth compromising your standards? Is it even worth it? [9:23] Why is it important to have these standards? [4:15] The Blessed Couple Podcast [16:31] In line with your ideal and standards, how do you decide what is worth fighting for or not? [18:06] Without the ideals and purely focusing on just your standards, you’ll be left with shame or justification [21:41] Misalignment with ideals and standards and not being open to work on it will cause that contradiction inside yourself. [24:34] Avoid making goals out of stress and stop and recalibrate instead. [28:51]