10 Steps to Happiness

Last month I went to my psychologist and I told her that I was afraid to be happy. She promptly got up and wrote on the top of a piece of paper "my past" and on the bottom "my happiness" and ripped the words apart. Then placed the two pieces of paper on the floor and told me to stand up. I stood beside "my past" and looked towards "my happiness" and I desperately ...wanted to move towards happiness, but I honestly was scared.

I cannot remember a time in my life when I was blissfully happy and content with my life. Of course my best memories are with my children travelling Australia, walking Cable Beach and watching the sunset every night for two years, but they are moments in time. I experienced happiness in those moments, but I never embodied it. I have never believed that I could be happy.

I have never embodied the feeling of happiness. What a revelation!

So, I looked down at "my past" and felt so torn. I wanted to move past it, but our past makes us who we are, doesn't it? Could I let go of all that I have been to become someone who CAN be happy. It's such a foreign feeling to be content with my life that it terrifies me. I have THE most amazing man in my life who loves and adores me and being loved by him makes me want to run for the hills, not because he isn't wonderful, but because I DON'T KNOW HOW to be happy with him. I spend most of my unconscious energy trying to push him away because I can't imagine what my life might be if I was happy. I can't imagine what it would feel like, look like or BE like for me.

I'm not saying being happy 100% of the time is realistic - I'm talking about moving my daily state of being from melancholy, to content - to be satisfied with my life in a glass-half-full-sort-of-way. I want it, I really do but when I stepped towards "my happiness" I felt a rising anxiety. I stopped in-front of it and looked down, my legs wanted to move forward into this new space of being, but I was so overwhelmed by fear. My legs were wanting to move forward but my heart kept stopping me. It was like an invisible barrier.

I looked back at "my past" and I didn't want to let it go, but my psychologist said it was okay to honour it, but find the bits that I want to travel with me in this new, content "me". That's the trouble with an existential and identity crisis, you simply don't know who you are and nothing makes sense. So, after a few minutes building courage to step forward, I did. And nothing happened. The world didn't collapse, no-one criticised me and all I received was a wonderful smile from someone, who in normal circumstances, might have been a friend. I tried to smile back - it was completely forced - but it was enough to make us both laugh.

I stood in "my happiness" for some time and she asked me what it felt like. In that moment the colours looked brighter and I felt contentment. I left "my past" in the office and I took "my happiness" and posted it in my bedroom and it's the first thing I see when I wake up. Ironically, the Powderfinger song "My Happiness" was on the radio on the way home.

In the days after the session I had plenty of these synchronicities and life felt grand, but soon, I slipped back into the old patterns of four decades of behaviour. I started self-criticising and dropped back into being melancholy. Like most things, this change is not going to happen overnight, but everything in me wants a new "normal", where I'm not crying every single day over the smallest things and creating sad lines on my face for old age.

Today, while I'm always on the edge of tears, but I'm going to take a chance on me and do what I need to do to step away from being someone who is known for being "intense" and "sad" or "over-emotional" and try on a new identity until it becomes my new "normal" - I'm going to fake it until I make it.

So these are my top tips which I learned from that experience:

1. Believe you can be happy .

2. Honour your past - find the good in it

3. Embody the feeling of happiness, no matter how fleeting

4. See a psychologist and unpack your sh*t - everyone has it, nobody is above needing one

5. Face your fears of being happy - own it, name that feeling.

6. Imagine what it might look like to be happy - practice visualising how you look, feel and think.

7. Acknowledge you deserve happiness - yes, you do.

8. Have the courage to take the step - what's the worst that could happen?

9. Be patient with yourself - this takes time, sit with it.

10. Fake it until you make it - eventually, you won't have to fake it.

Let me know if this helps you, because writing it definitely helped me.

In love,

Alyssa

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© Alyssa Curtayne 2019