I don't want to be happy. Today I feel like being sad, so just bog off with your happiness day and let me wallow in my misery.
There's just too much pressure in this world to be happy all the bloomin' time.
As a teenage flute player with well trained downward turning corners of the mouth, I would walk the corridors of the school to constantly be told to cheer up by feckless-fop-haired boys who thought they were God's gift. I would question myself, "Am I miserable? Do I have to smile all the time? What's it got to do with him anyway? Will any boy ever love me if I look miserable when I'm just thinking about nothing?"
The website for this day has ten tips for being happy, arranged in a useful acronym: GREAT DREAM.
G is for Giving. Apparently, doing things for others makes you happy. What rubbish! It is precisely because I'm sick of doing things for others that I'm having a miserable day. I don't want to make anyone else smile, or iron everyone's clothes, or make food for others to eat, or practise the piano, so that Les doesn't make an appearance at the Church.
R is for relating. Again, it's meant to be connecting with people that makes you happy. Oh, no. I don't want to talk to anyone. If I have to talk to people today to be happy.....well, I'm enjoying being miserable.
E is for exercise. This is probably true. If I go for a long walk I will probably feel happier. The Long Suffering Husband has just suggested that I go for a swim. "You're getting into that fug thing, again," he said, "Go for a swim. You know you like a swim." So, now the relating is making me irritable and I want him to go away so that I can be lazy and sad on my own.
A is for appreciating the world around you. I've looked out of the window. The weeds are beginning to grow, the daffodils are droopy, there is moss growing in the grass and the sun is shining in my eyes.
T is for trying out. If you keep learning new things it is meant to make you happy. Today I read a book about depression, I learnt a lot but it didn't make me happy. The Archers is making me learn about domestic abuse and that's not making me happy. As I write this I am watching Dr Thorne and thinking that this book was almost certainly written by a woman and it's making me sad that women had to publish their work in their husband's name (I'm sure fans of Anthony Trollope will disagree with me but I'm convinced this was written by his wife Rose) and still have to pretend to be men to sell their work (JK Rowling)
D is for direction and having goals to look forward to. Goals just make me anxious. Being anxious doesn't make me happy.
R is for resilience. Oh, yes, that works. Keep coming back for more of whatever makes you sad.
E is for emotion and taking a positive approach. We're back to the boy in the corridor with his blond hair and cut-away t-shirt telling me to smile. In the words of Eeyore, "I'd look on the bright side, if I could see it."
A is for acceptance. Yes. Now you're talking. I accept that I want to be miserable today. That is who I am today.
M is for meaning. You are meant to be part of something bigger, to make you happy. My proposal is to encourage anyone who wants to join me in a day of misery to do so. It's OK to be sad. If you want you can join me in Eeyore's gloomy place.
On second thoughts, don't. I really don't want to see anyone today.
I can be happy again tomorrow but today I'm having a day off and I don't care that there's a twitter hashtag telling me to be different.
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