Finding Happiness!

Finding Happiness!

I think we’ve been taught from such a young age that happiness is meant to be this big, all-consuming thing. That it is this moment that cracks open our bones and changes our lives and sweeps all of the weight inside of us away. That it is something that is awarded to us, gifted to us by the world. That it is something, we are all always in pursuit of until we find it.

And so we are always waiting. Waiting for this experience, this simplifying in life, this ‘aha’ moment where the wounds are all healed, and the growth is all organised neatly within our ribcages, and our hearts aren’t afraid of loving anymore, and the warmth never leaves.

But I don’t think happiness is big or infinite at all.

I think real happiness, true happiness exists in acceptance of the fact that we will always be balancing what is light and dark within ourselves. I think real happiness, true happiness exists in the quiet, in the smallest things.

In the morning cup of coffee, in the sound of your parents’ voice on the other end of the phone. I think real happiness, true happiness is believing that you are meant to be here, that you are meant to take up space in this world. I think real and true happiness is finding the human beings who take care of you – not in a materialistic way, but rather finding the human beings who take care of your soul, who take care of even the most chaotic parts of you. I think real happiness, true happiness is all around you at all times, pinned and blooming in things you stopped paying attention to because you were always searching for more. Flowers when you take a stroll on the road, the intensity in the air when you meet someone, and you know they’re going to change your life, your pet cuddling with you after a tiring day, the way your stomach flips when you hear your favourite song, the way your eyelashes feel as they blink across your neck when you’re holding them.

And I don’t think happiness is something you find, or that it is this destination you get to where the night never comes, and you are bulletproof and unaffected by the mayhem. I think the mayhem will always, always exist – we are literally made from it, we wouldn’t even be here if it weren’t for the crashing and banging of atoms within this universe.

No, I think happiness exists in the understanding that the pain holds just as much importance as the beauty.

I think happiness exists in finding the things that make us feel known and special and at peace in this world no matter how small or insignificant they feel and letting them save us. I think happiness exists in learning how to embrace the dark, in learning how to see it as the very thing that makes us appreciate the LIGHT!

• Author unknown, but what powerful words.