I just want to talk a little about Happiness.
I have made the most conscious choices in my life in the past 3 weeks. I have been choosing happiness. I've actually been preparing for this for a while now.
Practicing smiling in airports. Practicing accepting and resolving bad news. Practicing accepting and dismissing snarky emails... just overall practicing letting things be light, and letting happiness into my heart quicker and quicker.
But truth be told, this is a fairly new concept to me. I always felt and believed and had been taught that happiness was a choice, but for various reasons it never felt like it was an option that was available to me. Because I had been broken, or unwanted, or didn't belong, or unloved. Being happy wasn't in the cards for me. I could arrange happiness in other people's lives, and did, but I would not be granted the same gifts, because someone wasn't giving me that same gift, or I was unworthy to receive it.
Then a light went off.
I have been a victim to unhappiness for the better part of my life. Things have happened to me. I was not a lucky one. Bad things continue to happen to me, because that's all I have ever known. And although I believe that there is some truth to that, I felt like, but didn't know how to put my finger on the fact that I was perpetuating that. I was in a way choosing for good things not to happen, to be unlucky, to not get picked, to not be as happy as the people I helped be happy. I think some weird twisted part of that, in our most unhealthy victimized state, sort of relishes the fact that our lives are hard. Poor Lizzy. She has so much going for her, and yet she's so sad. I wish she could find someone, I wish that she could be pleased with what she has accomplished. But it wasn't enough. Nothing I could ever do or print or perform or give would be enough. I'd always felt that I was too much in so many ways, and just not enough in the ways that mattered.
I just don't buy it anymore, and I want to banish that sliver of self that would ever allow me to fall back on pity for anything in my life. Or what I don't have. Or have not accomplished. Or that I am in some way not enough.
More now than ever, I see my life for what it is. A Gift. No one owes me anything. I don't expect anything, and every good thing is a gift, a bonus, a buoy. So everyday I am waking up and choosing to be happy.
And what is so amazing, is how incredibly easy it is. I except all responsibilities for my actions. I except all trials (or contrast) as an opportunity. And when you decide to choose, things do not just happen to you. You see your way in and out of situations with a different perspective. What put me here? How will I choose to deal with this? What will I do when something like this comes along again. How many minutes before I can let this go and be happy again...
There is no more beating myself up. There is no more dwelling on things that were. I am no longer hiding from anything. For me, those things have become indulgent. And I can longer afford such a sick luxury. There are real boundaries that protect me and this space. Not walls. But the amazing thing is, is that when you are choosing to be happy, and you are making healthy choices, and you are not beating yourself up, then all of the bad choices, and the dark places, and the things that would cause you grief, seem to melt away, and you stop choosing them. You stop choosing to let them be the things that makes you up. Whether it be abusive damaging people, situations, fear, sadness, judging others, or a million other things; you release it all. You stop carrying things with you that just don't matter anymore. You look brightly to what is to come. You anticipate greatness in yourself and the people around you. You allow the good and the happy to be what you carry instead, and it's like a balloon tied to your wrist. And no one gets to take it away from you. And it's not going anywhere, unless you cut that string. And if you would do that, cut that string, please acknowledge why. Address it, let it go, and be happy again.
The most beautiful thing about all of it though, is the longer you sit with this, and choose it, the more natural it is, and happiness doesn't seem like a conscious choice anymore, it's just who you are. It's also vital that you have or find people around you that can help you build this consciousness. I have found these people in my life, and also I am so grateful to say that my dear family is getting on board and we are sailing forward together.
I was standing in my kitchen last night, eating some brussel sprouts, putting away some dishes, and like a gift from a sponsor in the Hunger Games, a little package with a parachute fell into my hands, and told me
I'm enough.
I always have been, I just know it now.
