Creating Happiness

Creating happiness takes work.

Wait, what???

Creating? You're either happy or you're not.

I believed that for a long time too.

The truth is, that statement is not accurate.

Another truth is that because I believed it to BE true, I was unhappy most of the time.

I felt like a victim. I thought I was a victim of life, circumstance, of other people’s words, actions and choices.

It took me a long time to learn that we are most often the victim of ourselves.

There isn't just one opposite to the word happy. We are complex (although oddly simple) creatures. There are a whole range of feelings that fall under the "unhappy" umbrella. We might not be sad. We might be angry, jealous, insecure, dissatisfied or anxious.

So many feelings leading to one overall truth.

Our strategy generally is to complain about the situation we believe is making us feel less than happy, in order to justify our feelings and then our behavior. We complain to other people, but mostly we complain silently in our head to ourselves.

I'm in a bad mood because....

"My partner doesn't understand me"

"My job is boring"

"I don't have enough money"

"My kids are out of control"

Like a child we think...”THIS is why I feel the way I feel, and this is why I'm acting the way I'm acting, it's not my fault, so there!!"

While this thought process my make us feel justified, self-righteous and sometimes even superior...it doesn't actually make us feel happy.

I circle back to creating happiness. We can all cultivate happiness in our lives, and it doesn't necessarily have to do with changing or cutting out the things we believe are making us unhappy.

Yes of course do more of "the things" that make you happy, be with more of the people that make you happy, and try to minimize the things that don't when possible.

Life is life however, and we can't always control what we are handed.

We can however choose what we do with it.

I was reminded of this fact this week when I lost my cool and reacted to a situation rather than responding to it. I then compounded the problem by being upset about the very fact that I had a human reaction. I was REACTING to my REACTION. Human beings are a special kind of exhausting, aren't we?

I think the majority, if not all of the time, we can work on creating our own happiness.

There is so much in our life that we can't control, so we like to try to control situations, people, conversations and narratives.

There may come a point when the realization hits that this is futile. The only thing we CAN control is ourselves. How does that thought make you feel? Is it scary or is it empowering? The answer: It should feel both. First terrifying and then brilliantly liberating!

The most honest question we can ask of ourselves is "Am I happy with my life?" If the answer is not a resounding "YES!!!" the second most honest answer we can ask ourselves is, "What can I personally do to start to change that right now?"

"Well something's lost, but something's gained, in living every day. I've looked at life from both sides now, from win and lose and still somehow, It's life's illusions I recall. I really don't know life at all." -Joni Mitchell