How To Be Happy

You read some books and Google some things and remember a quote or a Tweet you once heard about how sunshine all the time makes a desert. 

You open your heart and download a dating app. You giggle and flirt and show your best sides. We like to call this the highlight reel. You know, when you’re getting to know someone and you show them all of your best qualities. All good moods and positive outlooks. 

You tell yourself that the mind-body connection is something that’s important and you schedule in some hiking and buy some Greek yogurt. Then you remind yourself that eating cheesy dip and ice-cream makes your feel happy and that sounds like a pretty good mind-body dance, if there ever was one. 

You think about balance, and for some reason that makes you think about Yoga, which you’ve tried, but cannot focus on. You search for balance in other places, like selfless acts of kindness, and eating a little bit of ice-cream and cheesy dip, but not enough to send you into a procrastination coma. 

You think about day-to-day gifts and blessings like candid laughter and nervous excitement and the perfect photo. You embrace the wonderful technology we have at our fingertips and the fact that we still live in a world with trees and blue oceans. 

You hold someone’s hand long enough to push past the sweat and the trembles and the awkward waiting. You push past and you break through and then you say, “Have you seen that movie? I haven’t seen it either. Should we order a pizza and hold hands and watch it together?”

You think about your future and feel afraid of the unknown. You embrace the fear and turn it into optimism and enthusiasm for the present. People keep telling you to be present, that the time is now. You tell yourself this too. You begin to chant it. But you love the future. You are obsessed with the future. Then, then, then. Wait, wait, wait. If, if if. 

You accept this excitement and enjoy yourself right now anyway. Because right now you have something funny to read. You have a hot coffee to drink. You have a warm bed to snuggle in after a long day. You have nice teeth, or long legs, or a really clever brain. You have a favorite song and infinite information and you dance. You have books you love and people you love and everything is endless. 

You have it all, okay? This is how you do it. 

And you dance.