On (Un)happiness

"You can't stop the wave, but you can learn to swim." --(John Kabat Zinn)

So let's start swimming...

Back in the days when I was home and naive before life drifted me out of my comfort zone, I always relate happiness to periods  when have something to eat; or times when we have families and friends around. Knowing too well that they will do everything possible to make us smile.

Had I known?

Of course, there was more to what I knew back then. And I realised much more later in life. The English lexicon will define Happiness as an emotional feeling of joy, satisfaction contentment and fulfilment. Eventhough there are thousand more definitions to happiness depending on schools of thought, it is important to understand that happiness is deeper than in meaning than just mere laughters.

Happiness, to me, is a state of mind. It is a function of what you inherently feel in your subconsciousness. When you make a deep sigh, what do you feel? freedom or commotions? Do you feel like you have no worries or the world's problem have settlements on your mind?

Sometimes, It takes so much sadness to know exactly what happiness means. Like they say, you won't know how sweet the sugar is until you have a taste of bitterness. sometimes it costs nothing to be happy. While sometimes, you'd find yourself in between; not happy, yet not sad.

Life is really funny, right?

Well... If you know me well, you would have figured out how much I value happiness. As a matter of fact though, It took me a while to figure it out. I am a hedonist and I appreciate peace of mind. I will never understand the reason why some people stick to things that cause them persistent headaches and unrest of the mind. And I feel like we don't discuss peace of mind enough. 

As much as people preach about not attaching your happiness to temporary things, in one way or the other, we all find ourselves going against this pre. We can't helped it. The least we can do is fine tune the ratio. I mean, we all have things we attach our happiness to; things we do for fun. These things relief our pressure when life overwhelms and we need to unwind.

The truth is: everyone should be able to define their FUN their own way. What makes me happy should not be a measure for another person's happiness. Fun is unique and dynamic. It does not have to conform. But the best thing is to find FUN in anything that gives you happiness and find happiness in anything you regards as Fun.

Try asking yourself when last you were genuinely happy and see if you'd be able to recollect. It seems as though the word itself doesn't exist in the literal sense.

I envy kids a lot; even their grin amazes me. Do you know kids will not do anything they do not like or doesn't make them happy? That's why they cry in discomfort. Their smile is one of the most genuine things alive. So when I say I miss being a girl, that is exactly what I mean.

Fuck adulthood; it's just crap.

I honestly do wish I never grew. May be lacking some form of deficiencies would have helped because it's crazy out here. Religious faith is one factor that has kept many of us going.

I don't know what seems hardest to you but for me, the totality of living is the hardest thing to do. This post has been in my draft meant for July, to celebrate my birthday but I couldn't get done with it.

I was just a child; innocent one, when I started dealing with life in its true sense. I mean, the world seemed like a magic; so so unreal.

I saw a post some where that mentioned that 'it's a different thing entirely to have a life and not feel it'. Well, in as much as I agree with the post (in-depth), I kinda have a different perspective to it. I think we settle too much for unfair and unreal life. What I have felt in the last one year buttressed this point. At the end of the day, people look you and say 'that's life'. Why should we always deal with the hard life? I will like you to tell me in the Comment section. 

I'm about to share you my personal experience about what I have felt in the last one year. I have felt loved and yet unloved. I have felt deep hatred for  someone (it's the last person you would ever think of if I told you). I have been hated too anyway. I have felt rejected (this first you know, you need a shock absorber) and accepted too. I have felt being cared for and ignored too. I have felt unlucky and yet victorious too. I have felt undeserving and also worthy too. I have felt used and also useless too. I have felt manipulated. I have been determined and yes disappointed too. I have been defeated and triumphed too. Most of all, I felt unfulfilled. I'm still feeling it. Probably the only feeling left irreversed yet. But you see, I could go on and on. I have felt everything 'feelable' (if you will permit me to use that). But what I feel that I don't deserve is actually more than what I did deserve because I feel unworldly that at some point, wanted to take my own life.

What's the take home from my experience?

--Asides from the fact that you shouldn't put humans in charge of your happiness, you are not required to set yourself on fire to keep other people warm and short time thinking leads to long term consequences.

--Do yourself the favour of not trying to fit in, do not loose yourself trying to make other people comfortable. Sometimes in life we keep loving and wanting people who do not want us or our existence. Sometimes, we always want to be the fixer, the one that makes things happen and what do we get in return? Hypocritical love that is born out of hatred and envy. These people are unavoidable, they are around me and you.

One minutes, you are lively and good, the next minute, you are engulfed in sadness. Overthinkers can relate with what I'm about to say. overthinking mess your head and heart up because when things eventually happen, it comes with little or no effects. We saw it coming and We already played it our head right from start to finish before it happens. It makes event lose their substance in our eyes. At times, it stops us from achieving goodness because we are always trying to play safe. How then do you experience the bitterness of a decision when you haven't even seen the goodness?

This life is such a complicated one.

Some old adults haven't still experienced the type of pain we young adults and teenagers have felt and endured. Unseen and emotional pain that's only felt by the heart.  When Being strong can be so exhausting, we need actual support. 

If only our pillows could talk, if only our mirrors could explain, if only our bathrooms can inform visitors. We have normalized picturing the opposite of what we are feeling online. We appear smiling, happy, fine, all under the facade. The truth is, everyone of us have their battles. We are so lost in them that we care no more.

If you love someone, tell them and show them today.

Life isn't promising to get better, we all are living on hope.

We only can make it easier for ourselves.

I pray that every one reading this find the happiness and fulfilment they have been looking for.

Keep swimming...

❤️ and 💡 

Teni🤩