Giving it a shape

Okay . . . it's got to be done. The way to defeat a shapeless monster like unhappiness is to define it, to give it a shape, and only then (unless you're lucky) can you defeat it. It's that realisation that brings me to this post: Giving it a shape. By trying to list what makes me happy and what makes me unhappy, hopefully I can go about resculpting my life to include less of the negative and more of the positive. Can it be as simple as that?

What makes me unhappy

• Work . . . I hate my job. I spend 5 days out of 7 there evry week, week in week out and it's by far the most poisonous, toxic element of my life. I work for an organisation I don't believe in and manager I can't respect. The job bores me. I know I should leave but I need money to live. There's no doubt about it though, my job makes me unhappy.
• Friends . . . or lack of. Okay, this is nowhere near as bad as it sounds!! I moved away from my home town right across the country a couple of years ago. My friends are not within travelling distance, so I don't have anyone to do stuff with other than my girlfriend. It's harder meeting people with similar interests than you think, expecially when you're a guy, other guys tend to be suspicious of people trying to be their 'friend'
• Individuality . . . I feel like I've lost it. Moving away from my home town with my girlfriend, it feels like I dont have anything of my own. There's nothing i can say is just for me. This makes me feel like I'm losing myself.
• Ageing! . . . I'm 30 now and I don't feel like I've achieved anything yet, I don't feel like I've got going. I don't mind being 30, it's just the realisation that I've wasted too much time.
• Unrealised dreams . . . I would love to live in another country, one in particular. I know on my current course I can never achieve this dream. I love my girlfriend but to be with her means sacrificing that dream. I have travelled a bit but feel like I need to do so much more. There are other dreams I've yet to achieve, it feels like the clock is ticking.
  
• Anger . . . There's no other way of putting it, I'm angry. I have so much anger that I need to let go of and I just don't know how. It builds and builds and gets to me. Most of it comes from work.
• Lost optimism, cynicism . . . I used to love that about myself, I was always so optimistic but somehwere along that way that was replaced with a sort of cynicism about the world. Insight isn't always all it's cracked up to be, sometimes ignorance really is bliss.
  

What makes me happy

• My girlfriend . . . Cheesey I know but she makes me happy.
  
• Feeling like I'm making progress . . . That feeling of control over my own life makes me happy. I don't have it at the moment but I desperately want it.
  
• Watching movies with someone who also appreciates them . . . See the entry entitled 'friends' above.
• Feeling like I'm part of something . . . I dont feel like I'm part of any particular group or scene, but doing something for a unified cause makes me happy.
• Catharsis . . . Finding those things that provide a release. Few and far between at the moment.

This list is not in any way exhaustive and I'm sure over time I'll add more. Looking at this list objectively though, it seems obvious i need to:

• Find a new source of income. Whether this is a new job or some other source of income, I need to get the fuck away from where I work at the moment. More money would also allow me to travel more.
• Make new friends.
• Find some things to do that are just for me. Hopefully this might solve the 'friends' problem.
• Start achieving. Do something to be proud of.
• Come to terms with the fact that I may not be able to live in another country if I want to keep my relationship. Accept it and let it go.
• Do everything I can to achieve my other dreams.
• Find a solution to the anger problem. Whether this is a way to manage it, or a new perspective to enable me to not be angry any more.
• Accept the world for what it is. See the good and recover my optimism.

Sounds like something to be going on with, right?

I recommend making your own list. Leave me a comment and lets do this together.

No one is in control of your happiness but you

'No one is in control of your happiness but you; therefore, you have the power to change anything about yourself or your life that you want to change' Barbara de Angelis

Deep down I think we all know this to be true. The hard fact is that we tend to blame our unhappiness on others, but in truth we are the custodians of our own happiness. The way we react to events, how we ourselves perceive the world, that is the source of our happiness.

Of course that's all well and good, but maybe the filter through which we perceive the world has been muddied as we've aged, tarnished by a thousand events or disappointments, warped by cynicism. What then? Is it too late to correct it?

No. I don't believe it is. I think it's more a matter of finding a new, more optimistic way of seeing the world - and that's what this whole exercise is about, finding that perspective.

This will be the cornerstone of my happiness equation:

No one is in control of your happiness but you

Early days . . .

Hello world,

I've been thinking a lot lately about happiness, about the times in my life I have been happy, but mainly about the fact that I'm not happy right now. It seems to me that happiness is a lot like air - you only notice it when it's absent! I hope by writing this down it will enable me to look at the problem objectively and also provide a sort of catharsis, a release of the junk I've accumulated in my mind over the last couple of years.

As you're spending your precious time reading this, I'll promise you 2 things:

1. This will not be a downbeat moanfest. Wallowing in our unhappiness gets us nowhere and I won't have it. The time has come to be upbeat.
2. I will be honest.
3. I will learn to count.

So here's the plan. Throughout history many people, cultures and religions have given their take on happiness, on what it is that can make us happy. My plan is to research these solutions and test them out, to take what works and discard what doesn't. To find the key. My happiness equation.

It has to be out there somewhere, right?