Happiness Greed

So where does happiness come from? Unfortunately it comes from the realization that a situation has improved or changed. It rarely comes from noticing that everything is going well, hasn't changed and won't change soon. Why doesn't that cause happiness? Why don't we wake up each day so happy that tragedy hasn't struck? Why do we wait for good news, a new toy...new new new. To have new you must have old. And apparently old is bad.

I look at my kids and think that someday I would pay thousands to see them like they are today. Just to converse with them for 30 minutes and see their young faces, high voices and funny things that they come up with. I would stare at them endlessly in awe of how beautiful they are. But that's only because it would be so different than the adult version of them I'd be used to. That's so wrong. I want to appreciate them that way now. The closest I've come to triggering that feeling is when I've come back from a business trip after a week. The kids looked brand new. They flat out looked different. It was amazing. They might as well have been glowing. It was so great. I wouldn't change that feeling for the world.

When things appear to be going wrong or we get disappointed in our dreams we are often forgetting the dreams that have come true and that we are living right now. We've come to the end of so many journeys and received the prize at the end of the rainbow but we immediately look to the future as if it holds something greater. It's like happiness greed. Never satisfied.

I guess it's the American way and what we are taught from the beginning. I feel that Christianity tries to give us a clue in this area by encouraging us not to lay up treasures here on earth where thieves break in and steal and moths destroy.

I guess we need to realize that happiness is waiting for us to rediscover what we've already accomplished. It's a lot smarter to remember what you have than to go invent something new.