I’ve been told that happiness is a choice. By many many people, actually. But in my opinion, that’s A LOT easier said than done. Why? Because anyone can choose to be happy. Because all you have to say in order to do that and to make that impression is “I’m happy” or “I choose to be happy." But with saying that, are you actually truly happy? Because personally, I’ve been there. I’ve been in the position where I told my mom, my friends, and anyone who asked, that I was happy, but I was actually dying inside. Because there’s a difference between saying you’re happy and actually being happy. And I’m not saying that when someone says they’re happy, that they’re lying, because maybe some people are. But that was never the case with me.

There were days where I thought I was happy. But then I realized I wasn’t. I wasn’t happy just because I laughed a few times that day because in reality, I didn’t even eat lunch that day and I was walking down the school hallways in sweats, my hair in an un-brushed ponytail, bags underneath my eyes because I stayed up until 4:30 a.m. crying and had to be up at 6.

Sure, being sad because a boy couldn’t see my worth is actually pretty pathetic, but let me tell you, when you give someone your all and they throw it away, it’ll kill you inside. I was sad for nearly two months, but my god that two months felt like two years. I didn’t eat much, or I wouldn’t stop eating. I would sleep for either two hours or 15 hours at a time, and there was no in between. The only thing that stayed steady was the fact that I never left my room when I was home, and that there wasn’t a night where I didn’t cry for hours at a time.

There was eventually a point where I knew the depression was only getting worse and I told myself that I had to fix it before it actually ended up killing me. So one day, I woke up and I started letting the toxic people go, one by one. Deleted, blocked, and lost so many numbers. Slowly I started to wake up and actually wanted to make my hair look nice and put some makeup on. Slowly I started to wake up and actually wanted to get out of the house, actually wanted to see what color the sky beamed. I wanted to look at flowers and eat a snack in the middle of the day just for the hell of it. And then I started making new friends, and let me tell you, after being the girl who survived freshman and sophomore year with one real friend by my side, making new friends felt so amazing. I realized that being nothing but myself was how to make people like me, and that I had been doing it wrong all along. Before, all I wanted was to please everybody but after finding myself, the only person that I care if they’re pleased or not, is me. And that may make me sound selfish but I stopped caring about that when I figured out the hard way that being happy isn’t a choice but something that only you can do for you, because making someone the source of your happiness in this generation isn’t something that’ll end well.

My mom always tells me, “you can’t allow people that aren’t you the power to affect your happiness. You always give people too much power and that’s how you end up hurt.” After years, I finally realized she was right all along. But then again, she always is. Sometimes I wonder why it took me so long to get in a good place, but something I always tell my mom when I refuse her advice and end up hurt is “gosh mom, you have to let me figure it out myself. You have to let me get hurt and figure out how to fix it on my own.” And this time, I fixed it on my own.

Happiness is a choice, but not an easy one. You can choose to be happy and say, “I’m happy” when people ask you how you’re feeling. Because you can say anything, and those couple of words come out easily. But I think that in order to “choose” happiness, you have to be dedicated to making yourself happy and maintaining it. I’m not saying that now that I’m happy there aren’t going to be rough patches and bumpy roads, nights where I overthink, nights where I cry and maybe even nights where both happen. But I’m dedicated to maintaining my happiness and I have never been more satisfied with any other decision that I have made in this life.