SELF-EMPOWERMENT
The World Will Break Our Hearts if We Let It. It’s Time to Reclaim Happiness as Our Birthright
Are you the master of your inner domain, or are you letting yourself be controlled?
Do you ever feel like the world is booby-trapped to short-circuit happiness? If every person on this earth was happy with themselves and their life, why would we want anything else? And if we didn’t want anything else, what would happen to the economy that profits from making us worry?
We worry about getting sick while on vacation, getting into a car accident, losing our house to a fire, or God forbid, dying on that vacation, in that accident or fire, so we buy insurance for everything.
We worry about our kids being picked on at school for wearing the wrong kinds of clothes, so we buy into their worry of not fitting in, and over-spend at Hollister and Abercrombie & Fitch.
We worry about the next wrinkle or the extra five pounds we gained over Christmas, so we get a little Botox and buy those diet pills.
We worry about not measuring up, not keeping up, not looking young enough, rich enough, smart enough and that’s what the economy runs on. Our fear.
We are bombarded every day to worry about something. It’s hard to break away from the pack. It’s hard to be happy with what we have when everywhere we look, people are complaining and wanting more and more, falling prey to the promises that if we just buy this newest version of whatever, we’ll finally be happy.
Newsflash! No “thing” will ever bring us lasting happiness.
Humans are emotional beings and our emotional fields are affected either positively or negatively depending on what we take in. The marketing industry banks on this. Unless we live off the grid where no news will reach us, no ads will tempt us, no people will sway us, we will be affected by what we see around us.
I’ve noticed that certain things I do, and activities I engage in, either create feelings of joy, love, peace, and gratitude or have the opposite effect and cause me to feel depressed, annoyed, frustrated, jealous, and resentful.
I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to be a slave to anything outside of me. I want to be the master of my internal domain and learn how to create happiness from within, rather than feel the daily desperation of searching for it outside of me in the next shiny product, gizmo, program, or promise.
Being conscious of what works and doesn’t work to bring internal happiness is the starting point of reclaiming my power over my happiness. It’s up to me to choose what I feed my body, mind, and soul. Each decision comes with its own consequences.
But before I get to what creates happiness, I must first know what takes it away.
Here‘s my list of what makes me feel worse
Watching Facebook reels or TikTok videos Wearing high heels Not getting enough Zzzzzs Getting too much Zzzzzzs Sitting for too long Discord with my kids Clutter Malls Listening to people complain (this includes me) Not writing Cold rooms Aggressive people Sore neck Being ignored Sunday evenings (right before dusk) January Hustling Icy sidewalks Comparing myself to others Staring at my phone for too long Unresolved conflicts Repressed anger People talking too fast Being stuck in traffic
Things that make me better
Coffee (up to a certain amount, otherwise it hops over to the “worse” list) My yellow LAMY fountain pen with green ink Making soup Candlelight Smell of rain Daisies Seeing seeds grow into seedlings Writing Wood stoves with fire inside them Reading a good novel The exact right amount of sleep Walks in nature Hearing my beloved laugh Road trips Eighties music Watching Mrs. Doubtfire (I’ve probably seen it 20 times) A long, warm shower My cat, Max, curling up next to me Christmas lights Snowflakes A good BM (😉) Goose down duvets
The world we live in is not likely going to change any time soon. I have no control over what happens outside of me. I can only control my own choices, actions, and thoughts.
Today, I choose to do the things that bring me happiness.
Today, the economy will have to do with one less consumer.
What brings you happiness and what takes it away? Let me know in the comments or better yet, write about it in an article of your own, and don’t forget to tag me.
Here are some stories I enjoyed reading on Medium last week:
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