Let us start by defining what happiness means. Happiness is an emotional state of being, characterised by feelings of joy, satisfaction, fulfilment and contentment – a balance of emotions. It is that feeling that comes over you when you know life is good and you cannot help but smile.
If I ask this question to you today: Are you happy? What would be your reply ? But how can you be happy when life is happening to you:
• Living in an unhealthy relationship
• Losing your job
• The uncertainty of the future
• The comparison you do with others….thinking you are not good
enough
• Losing a loved one or friend
• Hurt with disloyalty from someone you put trust in
We live in a world in search of happiness. We look for it in accumulated wealth, things and objects, travel, bigger house, cars, jewellery, great job and so many more. Sometimes we believe that if we acquire a certain thing, experience or state we will be happy.
To have, possess and accomplish all the above is ok, more than ok, because we are meant to have and deserve all this and more. Yet it is not ok to think that all this will automatically give you happiness and if you do not have all this you are supposed to be not happy. That is false. It is the other way round.
How? Happiness will give you all that you desire. You gotta be happy first. How? Real, deep, inner happiness is not attached to material things. All the above will make our life easier and I repeat all is good. Yet to be in a state of inner happiness you need to be at peace with yourself, with who you are now, irrespective of what you own.
The development in technology has driven us to spend more time in the virtual world, in which through many platforms all the people in the world are at our fingertips. What can happen though is we can be entrapped into a comparison loop…….like going down the rabbit hole as Alice in Wonderland……he or she is more beautiful, they are more successful than I am, everybody else has a better life than I do. They have better cars, more luxurious lifestyles, more money, perfect bodies, more likes on their posts…….it is endless.
You start believing that you are not good enough and all this will put a negative impact on your self esteem. You start belittling yourself and let your inner happiness “get out of your bag”……your inner self. This issue of self confidence will reflect on how you start seeing yourself and it will sadden your thoughts and eventually your feelings, because feelings are the results of your thoughts.
Halt!!!!!!!! The virtual world is not the real world. We are fooling ourselves. I am not saying here that the social media platforms aren’t good. Yet let us use them wisely. It is like a hammer. You can build a house with a hammer and you can destroy a house with the same tool. The social media platform is a virtual world which people project, making every face and picture look flawless.
And still people are not happy? Why ? Because there is nothing best than authenticity, the real person, with imperfections, with a story, with a history. So how are we going to get out of this Alice in Wonderland “rabbit hole” ?
Here are some guidelines to help and uplift you, redirect you to enhance your self belief:
1. Switch off your phones at intervals and take time to look at and be in the real world. Connect with real family and friends.
2. Monitor whom you follow on social media. Detach from those profiles which only share negativity.
3. Give a time limit to yourself when to connect on the social media platforms
4. Never let what you see spiral your thoughts into the comparison loop
You are unique, you are special and you have something to give to yourself in this life. Reflect inward, inside of yourself. Your truth is always inside you. The journey to your inner happiness starts from inside you and you have got what it takes to be just HAPPY.
Penned by
Odette Chetcuti
