happiness
Happiness is defined as the state of being happy. Frankly, who doesn’t want to be happy? But how many of us actually understand it? How often do we take time in large and small moments to realize if we are genuinely happy? It’s a feeling that’s all too easy to feign, and all too easy to chase. It becomes diluted in so many different emotions, yet becomes some sort of goal line to cross.
Lately, that feeling, that word, everything that comes with it, just keeps coming to top of mind. With so much uncertainty in the world, so much fear around what’s next, it’s only natural to seek comfort. In that comfort, I keep coming back to people, things, activities, that make me happy. Choosing to be happy when it’s so incredibly easy to be down, upset, scared. Some days, that feels so incredibly daunting, like some enigma that I don’t think is possible. Other days, it feels incredibly easy — the sun is shining, the birds are chirping, and it feels wild that any bad is in the world.
In choosing to be happy, I’ve realized that has to come from a place of feeling incredibly vulnerable, and learning to have honest conversations with myself. Taking a moment to check in with myself and my emotions in situations. “How is this serving you?” “How are you feeling?” “Does this make you genuinely happy?” That dialogue offers an opening, a place to start building a foundation and focus on the good, the happy, leave behind that which doesn’t serve me.
So what have I actually learned? What actually makes me happy? I can tell you what it isn’t. It’s not running a million miles a minute to keep up with every facet of my social life, professional life, and missing the little things that build a lifetime. It’s not chasing milestones that society claims are important.
It’s quiet Saturday mornings with my baby girl, husband, and puppy, slowly waking up, making coffee, and staying in our PJs until lunch. It’s the warm smell of coffee in the morning and the comfort that comes with that. It’s being outside and hearing the wind rustle the leaves on the trees, and seeing the world in vivid blues and greens. It’s the sound of the waves on the beach, and the site of mountains seemingly rising up out of a lake. It’s that first sip of a phenomenal red wine, that transports you to Italy. It’s calling my best friend from high school and talking about chocolate chip cookies, high school, art, beaches, boys who became husbands, and planning for the future. It is seeing my friends’ kids and how quickly they’re growing up and becoming themselves. It is conversations with best friends about the hurdles in life, the not so pretty things, the things that challenge us, challenge our perceptions of ourselves and confronting our fears. It’s family calls discussing planting, wine and cooking, and eventually, our next family adventure.
It’s people, jokes, smiles and small moments that build a life. Carving out time for the things that make you happy — that make you want to put your phone down and get out of the grind, off the grid. It’s seeking out the things, people, and moments that make you want to sit back and smile — to be genuinely happy. Building a lifetime of those moments — that is happiness.
