Travis Kelce is the “Happiest I’ve Ever Been.” (No shit Sherlock).

Travis Kelce recently said in People Magazine that he is “oozing life.” According to him, his glass is neither half empty or half full. His cup is “all the way full.”

You can take that last sentence in one of two ways: a) if you’ve been having a shitty day, reading that probably just made your day (or life?) feel shittier. Or b) if you thought you were having an amazing day, Travis Kelce just made you realize that maybe your day was mediocre — at best.

I know. I’m exaggerating. The worst thing for our happiness levels is comparing them to other people. Economists have done studies of middle-class people who were content with their lifestyle…that is, until they moved into an even wealthier suburb. In an instant, these people not only realized they couldn’t keep up with the Joneses; they no longer felt like they were even a part of the Joneses.

They went from feeling like an established and respected member of society to feeling like an absolute turd.

And the only explanation for their emotional sea change of a transformation is that they compared themselves to their new neighbors rather than their old ones.

This is why social media is poison: it’s not only that it’s inauthentic and fake. It’s that it causes us to compare our lives with…well, the rest of all of fucking humanity.

Ok, back to our boy Travis Kelce. This guy claims to be having the time of his life — while I’m intellectually inclined to question the truth of any claim, I’m going to go with Kelce on this one. This guy just won his third superbowl, is dating Taylor Swift, and oh yeah…just got back from a weeklong vacation at the Bahamas.

Are you feeling sorry for this guy yet?

Don’t get me wrong. I’m happy for Travis Kelce. This guy’s killing it.

But in the context of one of the most stressful days I’ve had in months, I couldn’t help but think to myself: “of course you’re happy, you have less responsibilities than the rest of us.”

That last statement is undoubtedly subject to challenge of course. What isn’t subject to challenge is this:

Kelce’s responsibilities are more narcissistically-oriented than most of ours.

Here, let me explain.

Kelce doesn’t have kids. He doesn’t know what it feels like to completely re-orient one’s life for another human being because you love them more than you love yourself.

Kelce doesn’t have financial stress. He doesn’t have to worry about paying the mortgage or the rent like most people. Sure, money doesn’t make one happy, but it definitely helps with the stress levels. Less stress tends to make it a hell of a lot easier to access certain levels of happiness.

Kelce isn’t single. No, ladies. I’m not preaching co-dependency or the idea that we need to be in a relationship to be happy. We don’t. But when you are happy, and share that happiness with the love of your life, let’s just say that your happiness level goes off the happiness chart altogether.

Am I jealous of Travis Kelce? Maybe. Your subconscious would have to be mentally handicapped to not be.

But the conscious version of me isn’t jealous of him. That version of me simply recognizes that it’s easy to be happy if one walks in Travis Kelce’s shoes for a day.

Those shoes have more padding than the shoes of the undocumented mother who just crossed the border to give her child a better life than the one she lived.

And therein lies a difference that matters: happiness isn’t the only thing that matters in this world.

Because happiness is easy.

Responsibility, on the other hand, is a total buzzkill.

But as Jordan Peterson reminds us in his book 12 Rules for Life, the more responsibility we take on in our lives, the more meaning our lives take on.

I guess what I’m getting at is…

Parenting wasn’t very fun today. To be perfectly honest, it was a complete drag. Shuttling my kids (all by myself) between soccer practice and gymnastic class, after a full day of teaching apathetic teenagers, and having to figure out dinner after all of it…was?

Not fun.

Can we — yes, liberal and conservative parents — agree on at least that?

And maybe it’s okay that parenting felt like a drag today. Marriage sometimes feels like a drag. Work sometimes feels like a drag. Waking up in the morning feels like a drag.

Come to think of it, everything feels like a drag after a while, right? I’m sure Kim Jung Un of North Korea eventually gets tired of…? Having to even ask a servant for something?

Ok, I think that’s enough from me tonight. I got to get back to my kids. Better yet, I want to.

But I’d also be lying if I didn’t say that spending the last 30 minutes writing this blog (for myself, and you) was the best 30 minutes of my day today. Because writing on here forces me to breathe life back into myself. It forces me to give to myself, rather than others. Yes, you read that right:

I write on here selfishly.

And I will continue to.