be happy with myself

Two years ago I wrote my last entry saying that total happiness should be impossible (http://www.43things.com/people/progress/leftsider/97346). A lot of time has passed since then (and a lot of cheers! Thank you!). Yesterday was my 29th birthday, and, lying in bed with a fever the entire day prior, I thought a lot about death and what I would feel if I closed my eyes and never got to see my 29th year.

Surprisingly, I felt I would be happy. I have found love, companionship; I am appreciated and respected by those around me; I have found what I consider my calling and I have made positive progress in reaching it. I am on the right path, in the right direction. I am happy.

Of course I didn’t want to die. As I went through a pretty plain and uneventful day, however, everything seemed to be right. Not perfect, nor even ideal, but just the way it was.

In the time that I’ve been missing from writing entries I’ve been doing a lot of reading and thinking, Studying world religions and investigating philosophies. One thing that came from all this is that I think happiness actually has two meanings—mostly because we’ve used the word incorrectly.

In one sense, it means the opposite of sadness. We want to be happy so that we are not blue. On the other hand happiness means peacefulness, balance and pleasant mindfulness of our being. This is the definition I think most people here are searching for.

But they are not synonymous. In fact, the first definition is inextricably tied to the things we dislike; we cannot be truly happy but that we experience sadness, and sadness itself is the thing that makes us want happiness. You cannot remove one without removing both.

Here is where many may object; “Are you saying that we shouldn’t strive for happiness?” they’d say. In a sense, yes. Stop striving for things that will bring you a temporary “up” and force you to burn your energies in the impossible task of maintaining that high. This is akin to the addiction cycle of substance abusers; you are abusing happiness and it will only hurt you in the long run.

Instead, recognize and accept that you live as an imperfect person in an imperfect situation of an imperfect world. This guarantees your awareness that there will be things that are of varying degrees of good and bad in your life. Rather than being influenced by them, exert influence: accept their existence and your committment to improving all things. Learn to be at peace when things are gloomy and no one can take your joy when things are pleasant. The secret is that your true happiness comes from within, from the conquering of every moment by the will within your heart.

Every moment in my 29th birthday worked. It wasn’t a perfect day, but that shouldn’t matter and didn’t. For a day, I realized peace and satisfaction in every moment. I am happy with myself, and I wish nothing but the same for all of you. Best of efforts.

Been a while since I posted, and got a few war scars in the meantime, but I just wanted to say something I’m discovering that may be helpful to everyone else working on this.

Take a second and imagine what being totally happy with yourself would be like.

Now ask yourself, “Is there really nothing I can improve when I reach that point?” Hopefully, you’ll find there is something more.

Being happy with yourself is a journey, not a destination. It’s a thing (one of your 43things, in fact) but it’s not really a goal because you should always be going further. You should never stop trying to find more ways to appreciate yourself, improve yourself, and validate your abilities.

A lot of people think that being happy with yourself means that you can settle for where you are. I disagree. I think we should always be looking to greater heights while recognizing our already-accomplished feats. I feel this way because I feel that if everything is perfect-and you can go no higher-your only option is to go down from there.

I don’t believe that a person trying to be happy with themselves would want to go back down. It’s hard to imagine that person never undertaking a new development or finding something new to improve. So perfection in self-happiness would seem to be an impossibility. Besides, there are too many nuances and details that change in our lives to truly believe that everything is in perfect order at any given time.

I’m saying all this in hopes that, combined with the other comments I’ve made, it will help someone else as they work through this goal. You are worthwhile, you can do things, you have accomplished things already, and you don’t have to wait for perfection to congratulate yourself—especially since perfection in this area may very well be impossible. Hopefully that puts you a little closer to the top in your personal self-realization.

I’ve come to understand who I am (not what I’m not) after a lot of personal evaluation and thought. Trying very hard not to compare myself with others, I was able to at least get a better picture of who I am individually, since it’s this individual I want to be happy with.

I stumbled across an idea while doing this; how often are our perceptions of happiness based on perfect scenarios? I want to get a good job so that I can live comfortably and spend time with my hobbies—that whole timeline is contingent upon having a great job. So does that mean that I cannot live comfortably or enjoy my passions unless I first obtain perfect employment?

I’d like to think that it doesn’t. So, I’ve made a rule that SATISFACTION DOESN’T HAVE TO WAIT FOR PERFECTION. They’re not siamese twins; I can be satisfied with parts of my life as they are OR at their current point of progression.

I have a sneaking suspicion, too, that I could perfect something and still not be satisfied with it. Perhaps it was the wrong thing to start with; now that fact would be perfectly clear.

While this might sound like a bunch of useless theory, in truth it could open up a lot more happiness for a person, even today. If you’ve been waiting for the day that you accomplish your goals to give yourself a pat on the back, you’re way overdue. Look at your position and see how far you’ve come and give your self credit for making it this far. Reward yourself. Doing so could give you the boost you need to get out of the rut you’re in and try for more.

Separating satisfaction from perfection also allows you to focus your energies on the things that really need it. If my goal is to impress the hot French foreign exchange student, one of my projects may be to learn French first. That doesn’t mean that I have to master French before I say hello—French wasn’t my primary objective, so I don’t need to wait for perfection to to be satisfied with my results. Besides, faltering French is a great way for some one-on-one time where I can impress with my other abilities as well.

When you truly discover who you are, naturally you will find things you like and things that you’d prefer to change. Look at that list again and set markers for where along the road to perfection you’ll be satisfied with residing. Be realistic; you’re only making it harder on yourself if you’re 6’4” and won’t accept anything less than being a horse jockey in the Breeders’ Cup Championships.

Being happy doesn’t mean being perfect; and perfection is miles after being happy. If you’re looking to be perfect-not happy-that’s another goal that I have absolutely no experience with. But if you really want to be happy with yourself, accept your limitations and recognize your true goals, and happiness will be right around the corner.

Very few people are happy with the unknown. So the first step to being happy with yourself is understanding who you are.

Sure we know our names, but it’s more than that. Most of the time, we define who we are in the same way that a police make a composite sketch—listing a few items and a lot of things that we aren’t.

I don’t drink, I don’t smoke, I don’t have many friends, I don’t like boy bands, I don’t know what I want, etc…..all these things are NOT you; they’re who you are not.

But do we want to know who we are or who we are not? If I wanted to know who I’m not, I’m afraid it’d be difficult to define—it’s every other thing in existence. Just like the police sketch we make a shape and then try to add in a few things to see if it matches. I, personally, think this is the wrong way to discover who you are.

We are a combination of regular things arranged in a unique manner. What are those things? How do they connect? Where do they begin and end, and to where do they reach? WHO AM I?

Once we have a decent answer for that question, we can decide whether we’re happy—or what we can do to become more of what we want to be.