Why Do We Keep Ourselves From Being Happy?

The unhappiness that most of us inflict on ourselves on a day-to-day basis is usually based on fear: fear of failure, fear of success, fear of criticism or just fear of change. Fear of criticism is a big one and it is a very common pattern to protect oneself by saying, "It's not my fault that I haven't achieved what I want/should; it's because condition XYZ has not been met."