What is Happiness?

We’ve been taught from such a young age that happiness is meant to be this big, all consuming thing. That it is this moment that cracks us open, and sweeps all of the weight inside of us away. That it is something we’re always in pursuit of until we find it.

And so we are always waiting for happiness-this simplifying in life, this ‘aha’ moment where the wounds are healed and the growth is organized neatly within ribcage and our hearts aren’t afraid and the warmth never leaves.

But I don’t think happiness is big, or infinite at all. I think real happiness exists in the acceptance of the fact that we will always be balancing what is light and dark within ourselves. It exists in the quiet, in the small things. In a morning cup of coffee, in the sound of your mothers voice. I think real happiness is believing that you meant to be here, that you are meant to take up space. I think real happiness is finding the human beings who take care of you-not in a materialistic way, but rather, finding those who take care of your soul, those who truly see you. I think real happiness is all around you, at all times, pinned and blooming in the things you stopped paying attention to because you were always searching for more. Flowers on your walking journey. The intensity in the air when you meet someone and you know they’re going to change your life. The way your stomach flips when you hear your favourite song, or when you hold the person who fills you with the sunniest kind of hope.

I don’t think happiness is something you find, or that it is this destination you get to where you are bulletproof and unaffected by the mayhem. The mayhem will always exist — we are born from it, we wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for the crashing of atoms within this Universe. No, I think happiness exists in the understanding that the pain holds just as much importance as the beauty. Happiness exists in finding things that make us feel known and special and at peace in this world, no matter how small they feel, and letting them save us. Happiness exists in learning how to embrace the dark, in learning how to see it as the very thing that makes us appreciate the light.