I know what you're thinking: "This girl must have some serious issues." Because who doesn't want to live a happy life? No offense taken, seriously, I know how crazy it may sound to you guys. And I guess the title of this article isn't helping, either. Well, let me help you out of your confusion. I'm not this emo chick who hates everything, and this is certainly not going to be one of those articles about all the bad things that have occurred in my life or anything like that. On the contrary, I know that despite all the hardships I've faced, my life is pretty great compared to some.
With that being said, I still stand by what I said earlier: being happy is definitely not at the top of my bucket list when it comes to my life goals. Not because I don't want to be, but because happiness is a feeling that comes and goes. It may sound like common sense because I mean, duh, obviously happiness is an emotion that's not permanent. I'm sure we can all agree on that. You could be having the time of your life and then, BAM, one little thing has the ability to change your whole mood. While some of you are able to grasp that concept, others (like myself) have tried to dedicate their lives to achieve something that isn't even concrete. And how does one ever achieve a goal that is based off something so trivial as our emotions?
Our whole lives we are constantly told that no matter what we do in life, being happy is all that matters. While I do agree with that, I also think it gives us the false impression that being happy is a permanent state of mind that comes with age and experience. It didn't take me long to connect the dots and realize that basing how good my life was on something as temporary as an emotion was, more often than not, just leading to disappointment. I cannot begin to explain the feeling of defeat that I've experienced countless times when I've felt myself falling into a funk, rut, etc.
On top of feeling down, I would also stack up the feeling that whatever I had been doing up until that point was wrong because I hadn't reached the oh so preached about "happiness" everyone was talking about. The amount of pressure I put on myself in order to reach the everlasting bliss of complete happiness was weighing down on me. It took a while, but as soon as I stopped trying so hard to achieve this completely made-up concept of happiness, I was able to enjoy the simple pleasures that come with every day.
At the end of the day, we all have to take the good with the bad and not let the bad make us doubt how content we are with our lives. Even when those bad days come around, you have to keep pushing forward. We can't always feel the same as we did the day before because, whether we like it or not, life's a roller coaster. A roller coaster where you might as well get used to the dips, turns and the unexpected.
