Finding Your Happy

My niece recently asked me if I knew anyone who was truly happy. I knew she was going through a particularly trying time in her life and was feeling low, and she was probably looking for some assurance that she was not alone in what she was feeling. However, it was difficult for me to answer her question as I don’t think she and I define “happy” in quite the same way. Blame it on youth or a sign of the times, but I believe that some people still think of happiness as somewhere you eventually arrive, as in “happily ever after.” Personally, I see it as more of an elusive, occasional occurrence in life that comes and goes like the tide.

I think there is too much emphasis on being happy today, as though it were an absolute: you either are or you aren’t. I don’t believe that life is about walking around in a blanket of euphoria all the time. If that were the case, people wouldn’t strive for something better or work towards higher goals.  It seems to me that in the past, people didn’t have time to worry about whether they were happy or not. They worked hard and did what they needed to do in order to survive, and if moments came along that brought them a sliver of joy, they appreciated those moments for what they were.

Today, the pursuit of happiness seems to surround us, the end-all/be-all of our existence.  Sometimes I wonder if the self-centered, all-about-me search for bliss has left some of us expecting more than we can possibly receive in life and feeling disappointed that we can’t seem to get there. I will admit, on occasion I have worried that there is something wrong with me because I just couldn’t get to the point where I felt comfortable proclaiming: “Yes, I am happy!”

According to the Encarta Dictionary, “happy” is defined as: “feeling or showing pleasure, contentment, or joy.”  Happy is an emotion, not a perpetual state of existence. There is no “happily ever after” and doing everything that is expected of us won’t necessarily bring us to “happy.” My grandmother once said that she didn’t feel happy during an event or occasion, but she would later remember it as being happy. It makes sense to me. Caught up in the moment, sometimes we don’t take the time to think, “Yes, this is what it means to be happy.”