Can you buy happiness? Then, why do we still spend so much time trying to? And if happiness isn't in our purchasing power, or in our ability to acquire more, -- more things, more friends, more experiences -- where does it reside?
Well, it's been a whirlwind of a weekend for me....
One minute I’m bright eyed, bushy tailed and going on hour-long treks with the pooch, and within the next twelve hours I’m on my knees praying that the misery of the most violent, virulent form of stomach flu I’ve ever had ends, and soon.
In other words, I got sick this last weekend. Fortunately, it wasn’t Covid, but still... I got sick in a way I haven’t gotten sick for over a decade or two.
So sick I was shivering under blankets, unable to even sleep. So sick, that I got up the next day feeling like I had been run over by a Mac truck or in an MMA fight I was ill equipped for.
While I can’t confess to remembering much about the first day of my illness, except the abstract misery, what I do remember on day two and three is my incredible sense of renewed gratitude.
Gratitude for the things I often take for granted. For the people around me caring for me and checking in on me.
For having a home, and not just a home, a home with running water and flushing toilets. Having access to things and opportunities that the rest of the world would consider absolute, grandiose affluence.
Does that sound stupid? And yet, it’s so easy to forget.
If you’re reading this blog, I have to assume that you, like me, live in a world that constantly entices you with the promises of more. More money, more vacations, more achievement, more fame and authority in our careers.
We live in an online world that constantly reinforces this message of “more” and ties it up rather neatly with the idea of what we have not being enough.
Books that “We should all be Billionaires.” Blogs about not settling for anything less than extraordinary. Programs on getting to that elusive 6 figures. Facebook & Instagram posts on getting to the “next level.”
But what all of this belies, is just how extraordinary our lives already are, and we how miss it… grasping for the more.
We make ourselves unhappy in our pursuit of more, by not enjoying the enough that is right before our feet, right in front of our eyes.
We all want to fulfill our full potential, to see how far we can go. But we can’t be *merely* grasping at things and moments to add to our “collection."
We somehow have to strike a balance in the equation of “more” and “enough.”
If I’ve learned one thing over the years, it’s that happiness isn’t so easily bought by the simple acquirement of more. Though, goodness knows, I've certainly tried throughout my years.
Vacations to foreign places, an opulent bouquet of flowers, new cars, and designer brand clothing can all lose their pallor.
How many times have we bought something that initially gave a bump of pleasure, a brief high... only to ultimately elude the long term happiness we were really looking for?
And a skimpy eight dollar bouquet of flowers from the gas station bought on a whim from someone we love, a tomato from your own garden, or a perfume that reminds you of your mother can bring us back from the brink like nothing else can.
My point isn't to stop buying things you like, or to make smaller purchases. It's simply that trying to buy happiness is a sure fire way to feel less rich in life. It doesn't work.
Making a point to see the wonders before us, and relishing them, is infinitely harder than clicking a few buttons on Amazon. I’ll admit that upfront.
But the reward of being available to our own lives, even when they’re less than a million dollars, is joy, happiness, contentment, relaxation... And yes, gratitude.
It’s seeing the friendships and the family, we do have. The luxuries we an afford (like those flowers). The affluence we take for granted.
The health we have available to us now. The good food, and the time off we can partake of today.
There was a novel written by Neil Gaiman where in one scene, Death, always portrayed as a young woman, comes to find a lawyer about to cross over, who is greatly troubled.
Before he’s willing to go to the otherside, he tries to confirm with her, that somehow, through his many years on earth, he did more, he got more than the all the other humans. That he was somehow happier. Her chirpy reply?
“You lived what anybody gets. You got a lifetime. No more. No less.”
And that’s pretty much the truth of it.... We get a life. A start and a finish. That’s it. And that’s as true for the über-rich, and popular, and well-accomplished among us as anyone else.
What you fill it up with in the in-between, endless striving for more, resentment over what you didn’t get, or a life filled with being enthralled by what you did, is up to you.
And if you ask me, we could all use a reminder, every once in a while, to chose wisely.
And with that, I'm off.
All my love (and stay healthy),
Desirée Sommer
Desirée Sommer is a former Interior Designer, and a current Writer/Speaker who helps people just like you Style, Beautify and make their lives Fun again!
She happily resides in the rural beauty of Idaho with her pet pooch Bree, where she gets to take epic hikes, and plot her next big adventure/road trip/travel destination.
Oh and before you go. I have a gift for you!
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