Let’s get real for a moment, love.
Sometimes, somewhere deep inside us where we hate to admit it, we aren’t really, truly happy when other people are happy. Sometimes, instead, we feel smaller. Sometimes we feel off course. Sometimes other people seem to have it all together while we are struggling to keep things from falling apart.
I know it’s happened to you. You get up in the morning, fill your mug with steaming coffee, and head out to run some errands. You have a lovely drive. You are lost in thoughts of semi-contentment.
But then.
Then.
At the store you run into an acquaintance you haven’t seen in years.
She’s annoyingly put together. She just finished graduate school and managed to land a well-paying job. She also just got married and she and her spouse are building their dream home. With lots of land. And a pony.
What??? But you’ve always wanted a pony! Why do ponies just fall into other people’s laps? Why is it some people manage to suck up all the good karma while you have to (insert struggle here) every day? And who does she think she is, anyway? She probably never had to (insert hardship here) a day in her life.
Do you see what I did there? Do you recognize this monologue?
I’m sorry, I know it’s ugly. But it happens to the best of us, darling. More than we’d like to say.
But. Here’s a secret: it’s not really the pony you want.
Nope. It’s the feeling that having a pony gives you that you want.
Let’s think about that for a sec. What you want is a feeling. Not a pony.
Whoa. Mind blown, right? So how do you get the feeling of happiness without the pony?
This is why happiness is about perspective. As the wonderful Dr. Wayne Dyer so famously said, “Change your thoughts, change your life.” Understand that your struggle is your karmic lesson. Why do some people win the lottery and you don’t? Because it’s not in the Karmic Lesson Plan designed for you. Plain and simple.
Through your karmic lessons you have evolved. Through your evolution you have learned and developed a value system all your own. Through your value system, you have developed character traits that are of incredible service to the world. Therefore, your karmic lessons have made sure that everything you have to offer is exactly what the world needs right now. Boom. Thanks, Universe.
Look for the glitter in your own life. Have a happiness scavenger hunt. Work your way down this list and practice gratitude:
Something intoxicating
Something pretty
Something funny
Something delicious
Something inspiring
Something soft
Something luxurious
Practice acceptance. This shall be your new mantra: “Acceptance, not resistance.”
What you resist persists. You can disagree with reality all you want, but sadly for you, the fix is in. It’s going to win the argument. Let me repeat: reality is always going to win.
You can’t change it, but you can create all sorts of things within it. It may somewhat define the edges, but there’s lots of space to play. Don’t lose sight of that. You always have choices. There are always possibilities. The more you accept reality instead of resisting it, the more possibilities will be available to you.
So, take that, Reality. And the pony you rode in on, too.
Now for the audience participation portion. Repeat after me: I will not let Other
People’s Happiness threaten my own.
There. Doesn’t that feel better? You don’t need that lottery money, anyway.
You have big work to do instead. BIG.
I believe in you.
