I’ve decided that I’m going to be happy.

I've decided that I'm going to be happy.

I <3 John Bytheway! I know that most of his stuff is for teenagers, but the principals and stories he relates have just as much application in adult situations. For example, one of my favorites of his is "What I wish I'd known when I was Single". In it, he talks about people who interject their singleness into every situation.

"Hey, are you going to the concert this weekend?"

"Well, I really wish I had someone to go with, but I don't because I'm single"

Or

"Can you believe the construction on I-80 lately?"

"Yeah, the traffic gives me time to think about how I'm still single"

At first I laughed at it, but you know what? I realized that I'm that same way about pregnancy and babies. Maybe not quite that bad, but pretty close.


There's another part that stuck out to me, when he said that "An unhappy single person will almost never, by the simple act of becoming married, become a happy person" and it made me think, I'm somewhat unhappy right now without kinds, and I was definitely unsatisfied with being single, so what makes me think that just having kids will make me happy? I was an unhappy single person and I am not a very happy married person right now, so what needs to change?

The answer my friends, is that I need to change. Aubrey mentioned in her blog that happiness is more like a habit, and I wholeheartedly agree with her. There isn't a magical happiness fairy that sprinkles happiness on our lives like the last missing ingredient in a killer casserole. Happiness is like the hearty, homegrown-with-love starter ingredients. A little bit of paprika happiness is not going to help if your macaroni is rotten.


Call it a mid-year's resolution, but I am going to get into the habit of being happy. Not "I've got to put on a happy face for my friends" happy, but genuinely in-love-with-life happy. I think the biggest part of it will be getting out of my routine some more, and for Alan and I to spend more time among the living.

Wish me luck!