The Happiness Plateau

Smudge has just finished up at Kindy and started at school.  About a week before he made the transition, he informed me, “Mummy, Kindy doesn’t make me happy.”

“Why not?”  My over-active imagination begins to fill up with worst case scenarios.  Maybe he’s being bullied by other boys.  Or maybe he’s being bullied by girls.  Is there a Kindy teacher secretly abusing my child, or has he suddenly developed agoraphobia?

Of course, it’s a simple explanation.  “I don’t like rest time.  I get bored!”

We made it through the last few days, but the question stayed with me, because of how he phrased it:  “It doesn’t make me happy.”

If there’s one topic even more dividing than Miley Cyrus, it’s happiness.  There are millions of books, studies, pod casts and web pages dedicated to the pursuit of this elusive beast.  I actually didn’t have any intention of adding to the already vast pile, but as a mummy, this is a subject which slaps me in the face regularly.

Have you ever felt like your motherhood journey will be perfect when?  For example, “I’ll be so glad when he starts sleeping through,” or “God, I can’t wait till she’s three,” or “It’s much easier once they start school.”  We set ourselves these markers, and expect that we’ll be happy when we reach them.  Instead, we just find the mountain keeps going up, and happiness seems to be elusive.

It’s not just in our parenting lives where we feel this phenomenon.  How many times have you heard your girlfriends lament, “If only I could lose these last five kilos….  If only he’d propose…  If only I’d get that promotion…  Then I’d be happy.”  But it’s garbage:  the five kilos come off and we despair over our loose stomach folds.  She gets married and worries that she’s made the wrong choice.  The promotion happens and the work load doubles. 

There’s also my least favourite happy mantra:  “I’d be happy if I was rich.”  Now, people say that money doesn’t buy happiness, which isn’t exactly true.  If you live below the poverty line, more money will actually increase your happiness, up to a certain point. 

But if, like me and millions of other Aussies, you’re not a homeless person, just a family wavering financially between “just okay” and “kind of okay,” the stats show that an unexpected inheritance or a work bonus won’t actually increase your happiness beyond three months.  That’s it.  

My hubby loves buying lotto tickets, and delights in having long, detailed discussions with me about exactly what we’d do with the $6.8 million, including the breakdown of what we’d give to our extended family, the size of the jetty on our waterfront mansion and the itinerary for our round the world trip.

I loathe the lottery and the conversations associated with it.  I have a really visceral reaction to imaginary spending of pretend winnings.  My toes curl up, my body temperature rises and I leave the room.  Unfortunately, I know too much about the correlation between dollars and smiles. 

Think about it: when we were teenagers, we probably had more disposable income than we do right now, but were we happier?  How many stories have we read about the idiot who won lotto and was broke a year later?  Or realise that the last time we jumped income brackets, we just found a whole slew of new problems?

Money isn’t the answer to happiness.  Neither is a flatter tummy, a bigger house, a new job, better behaved children or exotic travels.  Don’t get me wrong: all of those things are great!  But if we don’t work out how to be happy right now – nothing external will ever fix what’s missing on the inside.

At the risk of sounding like Yoda, happiness isn’t the peak of a mountain: in every moment of the climb, it is.  If we truly believe that another baby or a million bucks or being a size 10 will make us happy, we’ll waste years of our life chasing goal posts.  Happiness is a choice and a journey.  We may experience unhappy moments (being left at the altar, doing time in a French prison) but it’s how we choose to react to the moments that define our happiness throughout life.

“Stop your rambling!  Tell me the secret of being happy!” I hear someone scream.  Sadly, I’m not a happiness expert or an academic or a spiritual guru.  Although I have been told that I look like the guy in this photo before… 

I can pass on a practice which has helped me reach a happier place:  A friend of mine gave me a “happiness” log sheet.  Every day for a month, you write down three things you’re grateful for, genuinely thank somebody for something in writing and spend five minutes relaxing or meditating.  For all of the women out there who are tired of chasing the happy, I’d love to encourage this practice as a way of allow the happy to find you.

Incidentally, my written thank you today is to you, for reading.  If I’ve said anything which made you smile, nod sagely in recognition or snort in disagreement, I’d welcome hearing about it - please leave a message below.