Happiness: We Want It, We Want It Not

By: Samantha Brennan

We all complain, about everything, all the time, every day. 

Work is hard, school is hard. Our girlfriends are needy. Our bodies are too big or too small. Our hours are too much and our paychecks too little. 

We have no time. No energy. No love. No joy. 

We want to be happy, but we won’t ever do anything about it. 

Generally, we all have an idea of what things make us happy. Working less. Spending more time in nature, less on social media. Reading more, watching less. Good food, good sleep, good company. 

Knowing these things, one would assume that we would at least attempt to complete some of these actions, but we don’t. 

Because we are afraid. We are afraid of being happy. 

We want it, but not really. We just say we do. 

What we really want is purpose. If we achieve happiness, if we become truly fulfilled, what will we have left to live for? 

The answer is everything. 

I just finished reading Glennon Doyle’s book, Untamed, which I had been reading since June. 

I loved every word. I loved sitting on the couch with a coffee, snuggled up in a thick plush blanket in the morning, and reading. I loved it, but I would never do it. 

Instead, I chose homework, studying, planning, organizing, working. I chose productivity over joy. 

I thought that life was about achieving and succeeding, but I failed to recognize that life was also about experiencing, feeling, learning, and loving. 

I was so afraid of feeling, that I didn’t allow myself any room for rest or joy or fun. 

Doyle wrote extensively about this phenomenon in her book. Instead of feeling, being, and listening within and to her body, she hid from it with alcohol, binge eating, and exercise. 

She hated yoga when she first began because she didn’t want to relax or feel. She didn’t want to fall into her own mind because she was afraid of what she’d find. 

When I read those lines, everything started to make sense to me. 

I had initially thought yoga was a waste of time, favoring sweaty, strenuous workouts where pain and exhaustion covered up all thoughts. I worked all day every day so I didn’t have any time to think. 

I restricted my food and planned my days down to the second. 

My motto was always, “keep going,” but I didn’t even know what I was going for, what I was trying to reach. 

Today, on the last day of Spring Break, I was standing outside in my hometown during my shift at work, looking at the mountains and feeling the sunshine against my skin, and I realized that I was missing it. I was missing life. 

This entire school year I had allowed myself to grow increasingly more disconnected with nature and with myself. 

I stopped reading, taking walks, doing yoga. I stopped cooking. I stopped sleeping. I stopped feeling.

I had told myself I was doing so to be a better person, more successful, praise-worthy, commendable. 

I started fixating, focusing, studying, and working harder and harder until, well, until right now. 

Normally on a Sunday, I drive an hour to school right from my job, go to the grocery store, put my clothes away, make dinner, and then do homework until the minute I go to bed at 11 p.m. 

Today, however, I decided to do something different, something for myself. 

After my shift ended, I drove back to my apartment, went to the grocery store, put my clothes away, and made dinner. Then, I wrapped myself in a thick plush blanket and opened up the book I had been reading for over a year.  

The first thing I thought when I closed the back cover was, “Wow, why don’t I read more often?” 

The same thing I say every time I finish a book. 

It was at that moment that I realized why. Happiness is harder than sadness, anger, and frustration.

Doyle was right. Being within yourself and listening to your body and mind is hard. It’s uncomfortable and scary.   

Happiness is a no outlet road. Once you reach it, there’s nowhere else to go, nothing else to see. That’s what I had always believed. 

But what if that spot, that ending point, is the best place to be? What if there’s no outlet to happiness because it doesn’t need to connect to anything else but you? 

I haven’t reached the end of that road yet, but I’ve decided that I will try. I will follow the signs and press on the gas and listen to every signal along the way.

Until then, of course, I will probably complain about the potholes and detours along the way, but not everyone, not every day, and not all the time. 

Because I will be busy reading, thinking, sleeping, eating, relaxing. I will be busy being happy, not just wishing to be. Well, at least I’m going to try.