Reason to the Madness

Life is crazy. Short and simple. Most of the time we bump along from one catastrophe to a financial crisis to a family fallout to an academic failure to a career blunder; on and on and on the list goes. When I talk to my friends and family, I find that on most occasions, they are doing their level best to hang on til everything blows over, to get through that day's or that week's struggle, to wait. Today I wondered...wait for what? For everything to get better? For all of your problems to go away, for the stress you are under to alleviate so that you can be happy, let loose, have some fun, enjoy your day? That's crap. Everything is never going to get better. Your problems aren't going anywhere. As soon as you fix one, another one comes. That's life; the process of learning from mistakes and growing as a person as you develop solution after solution to the problems life throws at you.

So what are you left with? Misery? Complacency? Monotony? It's entirely up to you. How you feel is a choice. I don't care how far off you are from finishing your mortgage, how close your daughter is to failing Freshman Comp, how miserable your job is or how put out you are that your Yorkshire Terrier keeps refusing to use the doggy door but instead prefers your new Persian rug. How you choose to view and respond to each and every incident in your life is your choice. Your co workers and friends and family that seem to be all smiles don't have less problems than you...they just choose not to let it get the best of them. Agreed, some problems are much bigger than others, but looking at the big picture here, if your unhappy, it's your fault. Hate to be blunt, know it's not exactly PC, but you have no one to blame but yourself. If there is something in your life making you unhappy and you have the power to change it but don't, it is no longer the obstacle's fault but rather your's. If you have no control over what is happening to you, then perception is everything.

I am, right now, at this moment, happier than I have ever been. Why? Because I choose to be. I wake up every day, sleepy, groggy, not exactly thrilled about 8 hours on my feet, frustrated about my finances, worried about the clunker of a car I have to rely on and concerned in general about all of the individuals that make up my rather large family. But I'm happy. I spent years waiting, on what I didn't know, but something. Something had to change, something had to get better. I was so indescribably miserable. I could never seem to get my head above water. For me it was always one thing right after another, with barely room to take a breath in between. Finally I was fed up. I ran out of patience with the backseat driver approach I had taken to my own life. I didn't gain anymore control over the unexpected, because no one can control that, but I could control how I felt and how I chose to react, and that has made all the difference.