If busyness made one happy I would be ecstatic…

I just got a book out of the library called ‘How to be happy, dammit’ – it appeals to my sense of humour, and also my mode of operation. I might request 'She was happy, dammit' to be put on my headstone, when I die. It reminds me of a wine-fuelled speech I made one New Years Eve, using our outdoor table as my soapbox. Surrounded my a few of my closest friends I was confident of a sympathetic audience, and challenged everyone that they had no excuses NOT to be happy and also no excuses not to do absolutely fabulous things with their lives. We were the most privileged people in the world I argued. We were young, financially sound, European (a sad, and unfortunate truth but one we should respond to appropriately), able bodied, intelligent, educated, free from oppression and war, mobile, fertile, the list went on and on. We had and have nothing to complain about. But I wonder if that also makes us complacent. To become a stunning butterfly the stodgey caterpillar has to struggle and fight to get out of the cocoon or else he would never be able to fly. Maybe life is too easy for us, maybe struggling some helps us fly. Maybe some of us are still stuck in the cocoon.

I tend to crowd my life I think so as not to think too much about happiness. How can you actually tell if you are happy? I am not unhappy – is that enough? Should I be expecting to be happy? Are the Americans who have the pursuit of happiness as a foundational right of all citizens, happy? I am content, I am enthusiastic, I have a sense of humour and enjoy life, but happy? I wonder if that is a personality trait rather than something we all can achieve. Can people make us happy? Can another person be responsible for our happiness? If another person makes us happy, is that accidental? And will that person always make us happy? Are we looking in the right place for happiness? Should happiness be a goal at all?

Helping C with her trig homework last night made me happy. I loved calculus at school. I loved how you could get the right answer, it was complete, it was right or wrong, it was absolute. I have always had the gift of the gab so subjects that focused on the written word were always my forte, but I found the absoluteness of maths very therapeutic.

Playing indoor netball yesterday made me happy, physically. Apart from the near heart attack I was having after 18 minutes of playing centre. My first game of netball in about 8 years nearly killed me, but at least I know I’m alive.

This piece of music I am listening to makes me enjoy this very moment, so I guess that is happiness. I am thrilled as I have always known I like it and now I know its name and composer.

Yesterday morning at church, the speaker tackled the enormous topic of ‘Christian Living’ in 45 mins. I had gone along with some questions in my heart and God met me. I am very grateful once again for his quiet reassurance. And that makes me very happy.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Trump may be the best thing that’s happened to the planet

Image
When sleeping women wake, mountains move – Chinese proverb I vowed to remove myself from all forms of media, social and otherwise to hibernate from the Trump winter that was about to descend as of the inauguration.   The women’s uprising (what else can you call it?) saved me from my despair, renewed me with hope, made me feel like I was in my own episode of Star Wars and part of the rebellion and revolution against the dark side of the force.   Cos Trump isn’t evil as much as frighteningly normal.   It’s a side of human nature – and its obviously prevalent. Like an outlaw moving into town, shooting up the locals and scaring people, the Trumpster has run roughshod over many painstakingly fought - one wonders what the fuck is he is thinking – the arrogance of the man to think these things are, what? The inane decisions of years of research down the toilet in 4 short days.  It beggars belief…   Unravelled the state medical care package that provided extra and accessible hea
Read more

I can’t keep quiet

I outed myself this week, on Facebook, as a non-pray-er.  This came as a surprise, as I knew it would to many people I had known for a long time.  I grew up in a traditional (and conservative) church, and have been a very authentic and passionate Christian.  But that has changed, but I had not really told many people yet. This blog is, however, about the non-prayer bit, not the Christian-no-more bit – that might come later. In terms of prayer, even as a Christian I never subscribed to the ‘moving the hand of God’ version of prayer nor the ‘asking God to bring-out-the-sun-for-the-Church-picnic type prayers.  I could see no sense in asking God to bring out the sun in New Zealand, when he didn’t seem to bring the rain for the droughts in Africa.  This wasn’t necessarily cos I didn’t think he couldn't, just that he didn't. It just wasn’t the way he worked, for whatever reason.  And asking God to intervene in the behaviour of others seems closer to witchcraft than God-craft.
Read more

Unexpectedly, a village

Image
Unexpectedly, my daughter (25) and her partner found themselves living with us in the last few weeks of her first pregnancy. They weren’t exactly excited about it. In their ideal imaginings, expecting their much wanted first baby, what they did not expect was to be back in her childhood bedroom, sharing a kitchen, bathroom and living area with her parents and siblings. Becoming an adult in our culture generally involves living independently in your own home, not with the 'olds'. Yet, here they were; pregnant, expectant and unable to nest or set up the baby’s room, or any of the other things she imagined she’d be doing at this time, all she could do, in fact, was rest. While honouring their disappointment, I harboured the suspicion that it was possibly the best thing any new parent could ask for, even though they didn’t realise it, yet. How could they? None of us really knows what to expect before that squishy ball of raw human need enters the world from the soft confines of h
Read more