Thinking yourself out of happiness

I think and think and think, I‘ve thought myself out of happiness one million times,but never once into it.
–Jonathan Safran Foer

Ask yourself whether you are happy, and you cease to be so.
–John Stuart Mill

Be.

Then, be happy.
–Someone I used to know

I became aware of just how fleeting the sense of happiness was, and how flimsy its basis: a warm restaurant after having come in from the rain, the smell of food and wine, interesting conversation, daylight falling weakly on the polished cherrywood of the tables. It took so little to move the mood from one level to another, as one might push pieces on a chessboard. Even to be aware of this, in the midst of a happy moment, was to push one of those pieces, and to become slightly less happy.
–Teju Cole/Open City

Everywhere I am lately, in my reading, all I see is happiness. People talking about how fragile and fleeting it is. People trying to find it. People talking about how difficult it is to be happy.

My first reaction is to agree. Then I pause for a second and consider it and find that I don’t really agree at all.

One thing is true for me: overthinking, as much as I enjoy it, has never really resulted in happiness for me.

Enjoyment, yes, often. I like to think. To turn something over in my head and see how many sides it has. How many points of view there are, and what I like and dislike about them.

Tears, frequently. Which doesn’t necessarily preclude enjoyment. I have nothing against crying, except when I cry when I feel angry and powerless because it makes me invisible. When it happens when I need to make a serious point about something, it makes that completely impossible.

But does that mean that I find it difficult to be happy? Not at all. In even the most unhappy and difficult times of my life, I am happy for more hours in the day than I am not.

I have laughed at more than one funeral. Even the worst day at work will find me smiling and laughing with my colleagues. When I was in the hospital with third degree burns, I was happy watching all of the various medical people do torturous things to my arm. That might have been the morphine. If it rains, I am happy about warm blankets. If it’s hot, it’s Popsicles. There is always a lot to be happy about in a life as easy as mine.

If I was abused, poor, uneducated? I can’t really answer that. Maybe I would be less happy.

But I don’t think (ha) that thinking automatically lessens happiness. In fact, if thinking is not abused, maybe it can even add to it.

For instance, I am writing from my back porch. Enjoying a bit of a breeze and an IPA, watching the baby bluejays try to fly out of my rhodie, watching the big fat bumblebees buzz around in the lavender. I am not doing a very good job concentrating on the writing. Sorry. I am very happy, all alone in my back yard.

Are there things that could possibly make this even better? Yep.

Am I thinking about them? Yep. A little. If they are out of my control, I move on. Johnny Depp is not going to come and have a beer with me. He just isn’t. That thought doesn’t lessen my happiness though.

If it could be a little bit cooler outside, it would be awesome. So noted. Am I even a little unhappy about that? Nope.

Would it be nice to be enjoying this hookah with someone? Yep. Could I think about that in a way that would make me less happy? Absolutely. It could turn into a suck fest of being unlovable and dying a sad lonely death. Is that happening as I think about it? Nah. It’s kind of making me laugh. Recognizing a needlessly dramatically gloomy thought and laughing at it tends to take the stinger right out of it.

If I can think my way out of happiness, surely I can think myself right back into it.

Tonight I don’t seem to need much help with it.
Just happy.