In Pursuit of Happiness

Do I truly want to be happy?

One would think that the answer is a resounding “YES,” I mean, who doesn’t want to be happy? But, the answer is a little more complicated than that.

If you asked yourself right now, “Do I truly want to be happy?” it’s highly likely that the answer might be yes. If you asked yourself the same question when say, your car broke down, your answer might be, “Well, I do want to be happy, but how can I be when this happened?” Over the course of our lives, we’ve unknowingly developed these restrictions on our happiness. Anything that we’ve subconsciously decided is good will lead to happiness and naturally, everything outside of that will lead to unhappiness. This is the rule by which many of us build our cognitive appraisals of situations that, in turn, lead to our emotional state. But what if our emotions weren’t so intrinsically linked to what we’ve decided is good or not?

The truth is, our emotions aren’t that related to circumstances. They are linked to our own thoughts and behaviors. That would mean we are in charge of our own happiness. Your car breaking down doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to be frustrated or unhappy. You could very well use concepts of radical acceptance, emotion regulation, and positive psychology to change your thoughts and behaviors to bring your mood up, but that would require a conscious decision to be happy and the exertion of mental energy to act on that decision. What’s more, based on the messages you’ve received throughout your life, you’re supposed to be frustrated and unhappy about this, so it wouldn’t make sense to try to be happy. This rationalization leaves you sitting in that unhappiness, why? Because you think you’re supposed to.

And I thought to myself, “Am I getting in the way of my own happiness?”

I caught myself in this trap recently. Due to unforeseen circumstances, I ended up temporarily living with my in-laws — every newlyweds’ dream, right? Even though I know all the techniques to improve my mood, I simply didn’t want to be happy. I kept thinking, “What newlywed would be happy about this? My unhappy feelings are completely valid.” I accepted that I would just be miserable for the entirety of our stay here and completely stopped my pursuit of happiness. When a negative thought crossed my mind, I held onto it and spiraled. Even though, as a therapist, I know the healthy thing to do is name the negative thought, distance myself from it, challenge it, and replace it with a positive one. I could not bring myself to use the tools I knew I had because it made sense that I felt the way I did. I sulked, isolated, complained, didn’t eat, stayed in bed — all the things I KNOW I’m NOT supposed to do to be happy. But then the hypocrisy set in because I knew in my line of work I had counseled others into holding themselves accountable to controlling their thoughts and behaviors. And I thought to myself, “Am I getting in the way of my own happiness?”

…only then will you be able to pursue happiness.

Everything in me balked at that idea. “No, because any newlywed would feel the same way! It’s not me, it’s the fact that I’m here! It’s my mother-in-law, it’s my father-in-law, it’s not having my own space and freedom! It can’t possibly be me!” Oh, but it was. It was a painful realization, just the thought made me physically uneasy. I’m sure you will feel the way when you try this, its our brains’ defense mechanism to avoid the guilt and shame of choosing your own unhappiness. We can take solace in the fact that many societal messages have told us to be sad, angry, or upset with situations that contradict what you would ideally have wanted, share the blame to make the shame more tolerable. But once you sit in the discomfort of knowing happiness was an option, and allow yourself to be held accountable for choosing misery, only then will you be able to pursue happiness.

I soon after realized, there is no law that says I have to be unhappy while living with my in-laws. I could technically be happy during this inconvenient situation. After this, I started to notice some of the positive sides of this living arrangement. I started allowing myself to challenge my negative thoughts instead of stewing in them. I practiced what I preached and used coping skills like journaling, radical acceptance, gratitude exercises, and mindfulness. Within days, my depressive symptoms diminished.

The positive psychology techniques definitely work, if you truly are in pursuit of happiness. It doesn’t feel good to realize your misery is a choice you have made, but let’s reframe that and say we’re realizing that we’re more in control of our happiness than we thought!

#cognitivebehavioraltherapy #positivepsychology #CBT #EmotionRegulation #Happiness #therapy #emotion #happy