choose happy

Recently, someone asked me “Are you actually that happy? How do you do it?!” Being the socially awkward little human that I am, I just laughed, shrugged it off, and said “I don’t know.”

I always get uncomfortable when people ask me things like that. “How are you so happy?”, “Why are you always so nice?” My instinct is to assume that they mean it in a condescending way. But people never do. It is genuine curiosity that makes people who see me or any of my social media wonder what the secret is.

The stress, anxiety, mediocre, sadness levels only seem to be rising in the US and so when I say “I just don’t know” what makes me happy 87% of the time, it isn’t helpful at all.

The truth is, I’m not always happy. I get stressed out to the point of tears, sad over silly things, and annoyed over petty issues. But I have made the decision to not let those things consume me. Every day I choose happy. It’s not easy, somedays it can be exhausting, but it is so worth it. There are only 525,600 minutes in a year (it’s okay, sing that line, I know you know it, + I bet you are a lovely singer) which isn’t very many. In the grand scheme of things, life is pretty darn short. So why waste anymore time than I have to on things that I can’t change? I would much rather spend my days with a smile on my face and not a care about what the haters are going to say. Sometimes it’s not easy, actually it’s pretty tough somedays. I just have to remind myself of all the reasons that I do have to be happy because there are so so so many of them.

Now, after I’ve said all of that, I know that my words can’t cure someone of depression. Telling someone to just not be sad about something that deserves sadness is like telling someone with arachnophobia to hold a spider. It’s just not going to happen. Feelings deserve to be felt + you are human. All I’m suggesting is that if the car in front of you cuts you off, welcome them into your lane with a smile and then go right back to singing along to the radio at the top of your lungs.