I know a babble a lot about change and assessment, but it's for a reason. I think these concepts are basic to our pursuit of happiness. I think being reasonable about them are necessary for our understanding of what keeps us miserable.
I know miserable sounds like a strong word here, but I find more often than not that the people I meet aren't just in a state of "not happy," most of them have spiraled all the way down into misery. Sometimes this misery is exaggerated. Sadly, often it's not.
A lot of people are existing in really crappy circumstances. They have dead end jobs or no jobs or just stressful shitty jobs or bad relationships or bad housing or illness . . . . hell, sometimes they have all of the above. I'm not some Pollyanna here who thinks happiness is easy to find. I know pursuing happiness can be very uphill. It's still worth it though.
There is a level of assessment where people screw themselves over. It kind of goes like this:
I can't be happy right now. Happiness for me can come
- only if I get a good job.
- only if I move out of this shitty house.
- only if my spouse stops doing drugs.
- only if I lose weight.
- only if I can find someone to marry.
- only if them political people I don't agree with all lose.
- only if nothing bad happens to me today.
You get the idea. We follow the logic that "I am miserable with the current situation and I can only be happy if it changes in a drastic way."
I'm not saying you won't be happier if the bad stuff changes. You probably will be. That may take a long time though. Until then, shouldn't you find ways to be happy? The right answer here is yes, you should.
So while you can't change all of the big stuff, assess what small changes you can make and MAKE them. I'll give you a couple of examples.
My cats can be destructive little assholes. I love them, but they cause problems . . . because they're cats. Since we moved into our current house, I've had this ongoing battle with them about my closet. They love hiding in there and I love having a closet free of flea eggs and cat puke. I tried stacking things to where they couldn't get in easily . . . but they still did. I reorganized everything to where only the smallest portion of the top of the closet was empty . . . and they still crawled in there.
In the meantime, I was annoyed with them. They would get in my closet, knock things out of it, and I would get even more annoyed. Emotionally, this was becoming quite a quagmire for me. It was getting to the point I didn't even want them in my room.
Finally, I realized that while there was any access available at all, the cats were going to get in the closet. I considered how often I actually needed things out of it and weighed this against just making it almost impossible to get into it . . . and then I realized I stored things I don't need that often and took some art canvases and blocked the closet up. The cats were angry and I got some dirty looks, but the problem is gone.
My other example is about the heat. The heat is horrible right now and while the temp goes down some at night, it's sadly not going down enough to make it comfortable. We don't leave the AC on at night, relying just on fans and the hope that things won't be so bad.
My room, due to location and set up, stays about three to four degrees hotter than the rest of the house. Useful in winter, not so much in the summer. Add to this the fact that I sleep with something blowing hot moist air into my face and you can see how my sleep has gotten worse and worse over the past week or so.
Last night things were really rough. I got almost no sleep and hence handled the world as a rather hostile and bitter zombie pretty much the whole day.It won't be happening again though because I moved my CPAP into the living room and will now be sleeping in the slightly cooler and more fan-blown space. I expect sleep and goodness as a result of this. I also suspect I'll be a far happier person in the morning.
The thing about "only if" statements is that, while they may be true, they don't help you in the moment. Yes, I will be far happier if the cats ever learn to stay out of places we don't want them in. I know for a fact I'll sleep happier when it's not so damned hot. However, neither of these things will be happening in the near future. Instead of continuing in my state of sarcastic and dramatic misery, I choose to do what I can to change my situations. It's a small happy, but it's what I can get at the moment.
It's also very worth it.
I'm not saying you won't be happier if the bad stuff changes. You probably will be. That may take a long time though. Until then, shouldn't you find ways to be happy? The right answer here is yes, you should.
So while you can't change all of the big stuff, assess what small changes you can make and MAKE them. I'll give you a couple of examples.
My cats can be destructive little assholes. I love them, but they cause problems . . . because they're cats. Since we moved into our current house, I've had this ongoing battle with them about my closet. They love hiding in there and I love having a closet free of flea eggs and cat puke. I tried stacking things to where they couldn't get in easily . . . but they still did. I reorganized everything to where only the smallest portion of the top of the closet was empty . . . and they still crawled in there.
In the meantime, I was annoyed with them. They would get in my closet, knock things out of it, and I would get even more annoyed. Emotionally, this was becoming quite a quagmire for me. It was getting to the point I didn't even want them in my room.
Finally, I realized that while there was any access available at all, the cats were going to get in the closet. I considered how often I actually needed things out of it and weighed this against just making it almost impossible to get into it . . . and then I realized I stored things I don't need that often and took some art canvases and blocked the closet up. The cats were angry and I got some dirty looks, but the problem is gone.
My other example is about the heat. The heat is horrible right now and while the temp goes down some at night, it's sadly not going down enough to make it comfortable. We don't leave the AC on at night, relying just on fans and the hope that things won't be so bad.
My room, due to location and set up, stays about three to four degrees hotter than the rest of the house. Useful in winter, not so much in the summer. Add to this the fact that I sleep with something blowing hot moist air into my face and you can see how my sleep has gotten worse and worse over the past week or so.
Last night things were really rough. I got almost no sleep and hence handled the world as a rather hostile and bitter zombie pretty much the whole day.It won't be happening again though because I moved my CPAP into the living room and will now be sleeping in the slightly cooler and more fan-blown space. I expect sleep and goodness as a result of this. I also suspect I'll be a far happier person in the morning.
The thing about "only if" statements is that, while they may be true, they don't help you in the moment. Yes, I will be far happier if the cats ever learn to stay out of places we don't want them in. I know for a fact I'll sleep happier when it's not so damned hot. However, neither of these things will be happening in the near future. Instead of continuing in my state of sarcastic and dramatic misery, I choose to do what I can to change my situations. It's a small happy, but it's what I can get at the moment.
It's also very worth it.
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