Choose to be Happy

Yesterday, I wrote on my Facebook that I hope all of my friends get to experience true happiness at some point in their lives.  It sounds like such an easy thing, being happy.  Sadly, it's really not that easy and there are far too many people who aren't  happy and whether they realize it or not, it shows.   I've been there myself, just kind of living life, but not really happy with my existence.  There were times when I could find somebody to blame for my unhappiness, when in reality, it was mine to control all along.  At the time, I'm not sure that I fully realized or appreciated how unhappy I actually was, but looking back it's pretty obvious to me.  Hindsight and what not.

My life isn't perfect.  My life hasn't been easy.  There was no silver spoon and nothing has ever been handed to me.  I have bad days like everybody else.  I encounter people that piss me off and I'd like to smack them. Sometimes I envision doing it in my head.  But they are irrelevant to me.  A small blip in my day that I'd like to skip, but unless I live in a bubble (which I do not) I don't have a choice about encountering. There are tons of things that I'd like to achieve, things I'd like to change, and things that just downright piss me off sometimes.  But the difference now is that these things don't overtake my life.  If something goes wrong, or somebody does something that makes me upset, I try my best to let it go.  Not because I don't care, but because I am choosing to be happy.   I've given up on trying to change things that can't be changed and trying to change people that can't be changed.  And the past....god the past...people need to learn to fucking let it go already.  It's over. It's history.  It can't be changed. It's not worth letting it rule your life.  Although I don't always agree with people in my life and the things they do, I have decided that it's their life and I can't control it.  But I do have the ability to control how their actions affect  me.  I try not to let other people upset  me enough that they affect my day in a bad way.  Why let them?  Why let people that treat you badly or take out their anger on you control anything in life? 

 There are a lot of things that I choose to laugh about instead of getting angry about these days.  Some people I deal with are just ridiculous, in my opinion, and although I'd love to try to get them to see things my way, or have them at least compromise on a decision, it can't always be done.  I know that now.  And I just leave it the way it is.  Not because I let people walk all over me, because if you know me well, you know I'm sure as hell not  that type.  I do it simply because their anger and negativity can bring me down if I choose to play into their crazy games.  So I don't.  Sometimes I smile and nod and just accept that they have their opinion and I have mine.  Other times, I look at the situation and honestly laugh.  The things some people feel the need to make into BIG issues is laughable when you actually think about it.   I laugh, and then I often feel bad that they are so unhappy that a minor issue can seem so big to them. 

One of the best decisions I've ever made was to let the people that only bring negativity into my life walk out of my life.  Or I've pushed them out.  Either way, they are gone.  It's not easy to do for everybody and some people probably think I'm a mean person for alienating some of the people that I have.  But it's my life.  They were making my life unhappy and I don't need that.  There was no good that came with the bad, so why bother with them?  To me, it seems so simple now, but it wasn't always as easy.

Obviously there are people in my life that I have no choice in dealing with and some of them are the type that if I had the choice, I wouldn't let them in my life.  These people drive me crazy, but I want to be happy, so I handle it as best as I can and I move the fuck on.  I don't sit and dwell about the conversations we've had, I don't sit and try to find out why they can't see things any other way but their own, honestly, I don't think about them at all, except when I have to deal with them.  I find this works for me.  I have friends that hear about some of these people or situations and they get themselves so angry about it.  They wonder why I'd put up with some of this stuff, and how I do.  It's not that I want to do it or enjoy doing it, but what I get from some of these situations is more important than putting these people out of my life.  And most of all, I am genuinely happy in my life, and I enjoy being happy, so their negativity doesn't affect me. I don't let it for more than 5 minutes or so.

I don't want there to be any misunderstanding about what I mean by happy.  Do I walk around every day smiling like a freakin' lunatic?  Do I smile and act polite to every person that is rude to me?  Do I never get impatient or mad when I'm sitting in traffic or a slow moving checkout line?   hahaha...Yea, fucking right.  I get mad all the time.  I'm not walking around on a constant drip of happy pills.  I'm a human.  I'm emotional.  I get upset.  I get angry.  I get impatient.  VERY IMPATIENT.   But the difference now, for me , is that I also get over it very quickly.  I laugh when I hear people tell me a story from 2 weeks ago about how they felt mistreated in some way and they are still visibly angry about it.  Or they read something that made them angry and they still are angry.  It's just not worth it.  All that extra energy we spend being angry could be used on much better things.  Or nothing at all if you choose. Your decision, your life.  I know that for me, I'm going to try to just put those things that make me angry out of my head and do something I enjoy instead.  Why bother being mad, staying mad, and carrying it around with you?  It doesn't change anything.  The situation is in the past and it won't change if you stay mad long enough.  All is does is drain you.  It makes you unhappy about your life and most likely this will lead to you being angry about other things that are quite trivial, but since you are already angry, they will seem far worse than they actually are.  

So just let it go....out the fucking window....off the bridge....wherever.  Take a deep breath.  Move on.  Choose to be happy. Let go of what and who brings you down.  You deserve it!!  

Thanks for reading!  As always, I would love to see your comments HERE on my blog (it's super easy!), but I appreciate any you give me, no matter how you do it!