Happiness is a choice

The pursuit of happiness is increasingly becoming a challenge many of us struggle with. For some unknown reason, we have gradually shifted the responsibility of finding happiness to third parties, with the hope that they will fill the void that occupies our lives. We have become dependent on other people to make us happy; in some cases, we have gone to extremes in trying to get these people to bring us the happiness we so badly need.  Many of us compromise so much in pursuit of this happiness;a few actually end up unhappier in the process as a direct result of the very people we count on to bring us happiness.

We continue shifting this responsibility to 3rd parties despite the disappointment. We continue to be victims of self pity, wallowing in our self created puddle of depression, hoping that our colleagues at work, our friends or members of the families will step in to help. Why we do this to ourselves is baffling.

I have been a victim of self pity recently. Although I felt my reasons were justified for walking around with my shoulders hanging and chin struggling against the forces of gravity, I knew there was a fundamental lessons I had to learn. Yes, I felt down for various reasons and I felt overwhelmed by the size of the problems presenting themselves in my life. As easy as it was to blame the problems that were bringing me misery on those responsible, it somehow felt unjustifiable to blame them for my unhappiness too.

But, you might argue that if someone is a problem in your life, then that very person is the source of your unhappiness. And while I might find common ground to agree with that, I learnt a different lesson and here it goes.

I encountered a number of problems at work and as much as I wanted to address these problems, I felt like each attempt failed. Worse, the people I knew were responsible for the problems (or the people to blame ) were not aware they were responsible for my unhappiness. Yes I made them aware but to no success. I spent weeks going to work unhappy, spending all day in a mood and eventually going back home unhappy. And the people I blamed for my unhappiness, lived their lives, laughed and went through the day in good spirits. It was at this point that I realized that I had a choice to make. It was either I continued going to work unhappy because I blamed other people for it, or to really reclaim my unhappiness and change that.

For the people I blamed, they felt it was enough to say sorry and move on, and they didn't care if I allowed that to influence my unhappy state too. I was so focused on the problems that I gave away my choice to be happy. I was so focused on blaming other people for what went wrong, I gave them power over my state of happiness (without them being aware).and worse, they couldn't be bothered.

Being happy is a state that we all individually create. We are responsible for our happiness and no one else. We cannot afford third parties the luxury of deciding what will make us happy or allow other people to take away our happiness as a result of foul play and problems they bring into our lives.

Let us do away with wallowing in our self pity and take responsibility. Happiness is yours to create, consume and enjoy. So be happy because you can, not because you depend on anyone to make you happy.

Smile. Laugh. Live