One of the biggest falsehoods in this world is that we must pursue happiness. As if it is something to obtain, something to work towards-to bottle up and store for a while. The truth is, happiness is within us, right now. Happiness is our natural state. Along the road of life, we get bombarded by external influences, feel the pressure from these forces, form expectations for ourselves and begin to "define" happiness. We start to believe we have to be a certain someone or have a special something just to be "happy." Happiness is here for us right now. Experiences don't determine happiness, our response to the experience is what invites or blocks the contentment into our lives.
Have you ever heard yourself navigating your way toward a "happy" place? "If I just had a better job... if only I could find my soulmate....if only I were ten pounds lighter....if only we had a bigger house." This daunting monologue plays out in our head (sometimes unconsciously) weighing us down and creating layers that block us from gratitude. Oh what a miserable (and meaningless) life this will be if we let circumstances define our state of being. If we let those tangible things define our contentment, we are at their mercy. So what happens when they fail us?
Even the "good things", we don't want to be at the mercy of. Because truth is, those things can be gone in an instant. Your house, gone. Your job, gone. Your health, gone. Your lover, gone.
My fiance's short life on earth brought this raw truth to my soul. For a good three years after his passing my contentment with life was at the mercy of our love-leaving me unpleasant to be around, not as productive for God, and torturous for my own health.
When I worked through the layers of grief, extending gratitude for what was, I found a remarkable reality that yeah, happiness really is in ME. It is available to me at any point, I get to choose to access it.
Certainly the people in our lives and the material gifts we do have can encourage our happiness, can provide joy, but they don't make you happy. They beautifully enhance your state of being when present, and they can shake you up a bit (okay A LOT) when leaving, but there is an opportunity to keep that contentment along the ride.
The key to finding that contentment along the ride: Gratitude.
Gratitude.
Maybe it's finding gratitude in loss, because it means you had the privilege to love. Finding gratitude in a job transfer, because God has bigger plans for you. Finding gratitude in the body you live in, and seeing the excess weight as a message to serve your body a little better.
Or my new fav I had opportunity to practice during a drugless bone marrow biopsy: Gratitude for pain because it means you can feel.
This gratitude exercise is not always easy. It's exercise. And as we know, some exercise classes kick your butt, leaving you deserted by your own breath, and other routines are more manageable. But this exercise has a guaranteed 100% success rate to bring out more happy.
This Thanksgiving, as you join your loved ones around the table (and honor those you bring to the table in spirit :) exercise your way to happy. It's easy to find gratitude in the "good things." But that will fade tomorrow or next week when you aren't around the turkey and grandma's stuffing. See if you can extend new found gratitude for even the sticky stuff this Thanksgiving.
And....be truly happy.
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