The damned thing about being happy

Happiness is a bugger. And I’ll tell you why. You’re never aware of how happy you are, or even that you’re happy, until it’s over.

The reason you don’t is obvious – you’re too busy being happy!

On the other hand, when you’re miserable, you’re aware of it every single moment as it happens. If you’re like a lot of people, you announce it to the world. You proclaim it. Hell, if it didn’t cost so much, we’d take out bloody ads so that everyone can know our lives are in the crapper.

But when you’re happy, you don’t give a monkey’s rump whether anyone knows. You don’t even know yourself. You’re just busy being happy.

And maybe that’s the thing about being happy – it takes us out of ourselves. Whereas its opposite, unhappiness, pulls us in. There is that Robert Frost quote:

"Happiness makes up in height for what it lacks in length."

Perhaps that has more to do with perception than anything else. Happiness seems short because we’re out of ourselves and blissfully unaware. On the other hand, unhappy we’re completely within ourselves and aware of every … single … solitary … miserable … moment.

Yes, I can see where it would seem long.

Actually, I suppose happy people are aware they are happy. It's probably more accurate to say they don't think about their state of happiness as much as unhappy people think about their state of unhappiness.

Who wants to waste time thinking about how happy they are when they can simply be happy?