I read an interesting book about happiness called Happiness is a Serious Problem by Dennis Prager. My brother challenged me to read it after one of our many conversations. The book focuses on the things that make us unhappy and then the things that make us happy. One part in particular has been staying with me and come to surface in my thoughts a lot lately.
Prager makes the premise that we have an obligation to those we love to be happy. The logic goes like this.
"We owe it to others to work on our happiness. We do not enjoy being around others who are usually unhappy. Those who enter our lives feel the same way." (page 3, kindle version)
It's like the old saying, "If mommma ain't happy, nobody's happy." (Did you know that's a song?)
He also says that we owe it to our faith to work on being happy. Because if our faith is truly so impressive, why aren't we happy? Either we are not praciticing our faith correctly then or we are practicing it correctly but our religion itself is not conducive to happiness.
So, what is happiness? I'm not talking about giddy, silliness here. But an overall sense of well-being. It's hard to define happiness, but I know I'm not happy.
This has all gotten me thinking that I owe it to my family to be happier. At the very least, I must become less negative. My negativity toward my life, my work, and my body is showing up as directly impacting my children and their outlook on life. This is not good.
So, how do I become more happy?
What I know for sure is that I need. to. change.
I'm so unhappy lately. So tired of the rat race and the constant pressure on every second of my time to do more, be more, work smarter, plan better. Tired of my fat body. Unhappy with all emphasis I place on the size on my fat body.
The helplessness of it comes with the sense that there are so many things in my schedule that I cannot change. There's a trapped feeling. I feel trapped with a hectic life and a fat body.
And I have laid my self esteem and happiness down in sacrifice to the schedule and the number on the scale.
What do I do? I have to figure this out because I have enough "shoulds" in my life to fill a million calendars. It's killing me. My health is eaking out in a long stream because the shoulds are consuming me from the inside out.
This is the line in the sand. I will fall on my face to the One who is the Master of life and who knows what is truly important. I will rip from my schedule the things that suck me dry and leave my family with the leftovers. I will hold sacred the moments when my girls are here with me. I will turn my health around (more on that in another post).
No longer will I see my obligation as being to all the inconsequentials. I will pursue happiness, not in an artifical, worldy way; but in the peace of spending my time on the things that matter.
On Wednesdays, I'm going to write about my journey to "get happy." This is my way of holding myself accountable on working on this. You can join me!
Sorry this is so long. Are you still there? Thanks for hanging in there! What do you think about happiness? Do I have a chance at finding it? Do you struggle too?
