What is Our Source of Happiness?

A little girl was tackling a math question, brows furrowed in concentration. Realizing she’d made a mistake, she tucked her pencil – a neon green mechanical pencil – behind a little ear and proceeded to erase the errors.

When that was done, she looked around the desk for the neon green pencil. It wasn’t there. She looked everywhere for it and couldn’t find it. Exasperated, she sat back down and reflexively tucked her hair behind her ear. That was when she felt the pencil.

She never lost it in the first place.

The misplacement of happiness…

So many of us spend our lives looking for happiness and pursuing happiness. What if happiness was like the pencil, and we never lost it in the first place?

I’m sure you’ve observed young children. They laugh at the smallest things, like peekaboo, cartoon characters falling, fart sounds and silly faces. We were all like that once. Little things made us happy.

As we grew up, those things that used to make us laugh became childish and stupid. In our teenage years, we got all hormonal and only found happiness in whatever expressed our angst or interest, and when school’s out.

In adulthood, Fridays and vacations made us happy. We work jobs that made us dread Sundays and spent the money we earned on things to make ourselves happy. We can’t just quit a job if we’re unhappy. Job security is important! We have to find another job before we leave this one, or the resume won’t look good. And when we’re jobless, we can’t be happy.

Somewhere along the line, happiness became tied to so many things – grades, friends, jobs, things, family, success, money, free time, body image, health, Instagram pictures, appearance, and a million other things. It drifts away, becoming ever harder to attain as we age.

…in objects

Many people think that maybe, if we had that job, that new phone or more clothes and sparkly things, maybe we’ll be happy? A bigger house perhaps?

If happiness were in objects, the object that made you very happy would have made me very happy too. And the happiness would never go away as long as you own the object, but that’s not the case. If we were happy about getting a new phone, the happiness soon fades away. That initial spark of happiness is just a temporary suspension of our feeling of lack.

…in improvements

Or maybe, I just need to become better at something. Maybe if we made more money and had more success at work, we’ll be happy.

But what is “better”? When does it stop? “Better” drove so many people into depression and suicide because “better” carries the implied meaning of “not good enough”. So many people became the best at what they do and still suffered from depression. At the very top, some of them still didn’t find what they were looking for.

…in relationships

It’s true that relationships are very important in our lives. In a Harvard study, researchers have found that people with strong relationships in their lives live happier and healthier lives. While those who are lonely experience more health issues and are less happy.

However, while relationships can make us very happy, it isn’t the source of happiness. If it is, losing relationships that made us happy would mean that we’ll never be happy again, but it simply doesn’t work that way. However difficult it is, we move on in different ways.

The source of happiness

If you look at all the times you were happy, from childhood all the way to your current stage in life, you’ll find that there’s only one common denominator.

Compare the time you, as a toddler, laughed as someone played peekaboo with you, the time you got a raise at your job, and spending a good day with your loved ones.

Three very different scenarios that made you happy.

What was the common thing?

You.

We have always been the source of our happiness, but somewhere along the line, we’ve misplaced happiness as we dealt with life’s challenges and tasks. Like the girl misplaced her pencil.

The well of happiness has always been right here within us. This is why a minimalist with 100 things can be as happy as a collector with 10,000 things. And a hermit can be as happy as a world traveler. Happiness originates from us, not objects or experience.

So what if we know we’re the source of happiness?

Just like the girl with the forgotten pencil perched on her ear, we’ll keep searching the external world for happiness if we don’t know that we’re the source of it. The more we search, the more frustrated and lost we’ll get.

Unfortunately, knowing we’re the source of our happiness doesn’t mean we’ll live happily ever after. What it does is allow us to focus on our minds for happiness instead of look everywhere else for it. Also, it makes us responsible for our own happiness.

It’s up to us to come to terms with ourselves and our situations. When we are content with what we have, we have happiness.

The exception to this is when you’re in an abusive situation or a situation that isn’t suitable for your temperament.

If you’re an introvert with a strong sense of justice, working as a salesperson for questionable medications will make you miserable no matter how much you try to make peace with the situation.

In conclusion

I struggle with unhappiness because I cannot come to terms with my ability and situation, but I understand that it’s an internal problem and not a lack of object or experience. Knowing this makes working toward a happy life a lot more efficient.

That’s the value of recognizing where the source of our happiness is. If you’re floundering for happiness, perhaps it’s time to turn inward.

I hope you can make peace with yourself and your situation, and face 2020 with a refreshed perspective. We can be happy, right at this moment.

Do you agree that we’re the source of our happiness? Let me know what you think in the comments! And please subscribe if you like content like this!