Happy.

A client is learning how to be happy.

Her topsy-turvy life started with not knowing what happiness is or the toolkit to learn.

What is happiness?

It’s a common question (Google presented 1,090,000,000 results in 0.57 seconds). Sonja Lyubomirsky, a well-regarded emotion researcher states happiness is both momentary optimism and deep systemic contentment. Often, momentary optimism is the relief that arises when a lack is assuaged. The sense of lack is deep within us from waking to sleeping and in our dreams. The lack manifests as a yearning to fit in, feeling on the outer, not belonging, not accepted. It drives our mind in myriad ways to inform us we are insufficiently endowed with intelligence, attractiveness, wealth, kindness, diligence and success. My made-up mathematical formula is:

(loss of connection) + (shame) = lack

This lack pulls at our purse-strings and heart-strings to spend money we don't have, to undermine our confidence and dignity, to expend energy seeking to belong or deny our wants. It's what triggers contempt for people who have none of the desired attribute or disdain for those who have it in abundance. We hide our contempt by blame. Our self-denied envy is evident by the disdainful phrase I'm not like that, only those people over there are like that. Happiness is also not the toxic positivity of Pollyanna with a 50% emotional maximum. This decreasingly effective form of optimism reduces our scope to tolerate the uncomfortable, thereby restricting the emotional availability required in deep relationships. I was raised with the just think positively mantra and my visceral reaction to someone who proclaims that my mind will easily sway is to have a clear and determined desire to punch them on the nose. The long-term emotional loss for the Pollyanna is peace of mind as there is no way to avoid the pain that is part and parcel of life. Disavowing discomfort becomes a channel of restless energy as our anxious neurons furrow ever-deeper. If you live with rose-tinted glasses, you're missing the spectrum. Contrast is central to the human experience. Demanding that life be only good becomes a never-ending hedonic treadmill. To experience deep systemic contentment means allowing yourself to be uncomfortable. Although feeling bad is physically painful, it's no bad thing.

Who am I to give happiness guidance to a client?

How did I get happy? Being upbeat isn't my natural inclination. Between inheriting my father's sorrowful disposition, experiencing a few tricky things in early life and the only example for how to be happy meant having steely positivity, the bulk of my life was underpinned by cantankerous melancholy. Some call it dysthymia. The phenomenal experience was of sitting in a mud puddle oozing with unresolved grief and unrecognised despair. It wasn't for lack of trying to resolve it but gaining stable footing to step out of the mire remained elusive. About 5 years ago I said to a friend, I've got a good job, good relationship, good friendships, good contact with my family, good health, and good mental well-being. I've got everything I ever wanted – but I'm still unhappy. You'll note the yearning wasn't for a consumerist life. Nor was it whether I had good quality relationships or how much to smile. What happened is I ran out of places to blame my woes. The conscience mirror proclaimed that if I wanted to be happy, the buck stopped with me. Soon after, I heard Pema Chodron's cheerfulness practice; an easy meditation to lift one's spirits. The practice took 5 minutes a day. All I had to do was contemplate the previous day's congenial events such as the sun on my back, a thank you, a cuppa, a smile. I had nothing to lose. For 2 years, this was my daily practice. Three years later, I returned to my apartment in Sydney. Within a month, the kitchen tap broke. In the days that followed, I recollected what went through my mind. Recalling the flooding water and how I responded, this went through my mind: Thank goodness this didn't happen when my tenant was here, thank goodness it happened when I was home, thank goodness I'm on happy terms with my neighbour and have her key, thank goodness she has lots of towels, thank goodness I have money in my bank account, thank goodness I have a washing machine and washing lines, thank goodness I can get this fixed. And this is the practice I set my client. If I can change a life of low-grade depression and find the positive in a negative, she can too. In these confusing and stressful times when predictability has gone out the window, what is there to lose?

Wendy Nash | Kindly Cut The Crap