Sometimes I forget some of the more sane, even wise, notions I put forth when I was younger. In my book, Depression's Seven Steps to Self-Understanding, which was published maybe eleven years ago, I spoke of the place of "happiness" in our lives and how it is so overemphasized because we are not only so unhappy but because we even more so refuse to face, much less realize, the reasons why. Rather than being willing to see the pain that is within us, that is within the world itself, we all believe that we must maintain a facade, a masque of "happiness" at all times. We equate happiness with "healthiness," with "good spirits." We dare not expose ourselves as unhappy, believing that to do such will only "spiral us downwards" into the deepest depression, even suicide. We believe that once we "open ourselves up," like Pandora's Box, all hell will break loose and we will either burn up in the flames of our own rage or drown in the tears of our own sorrow. In my book, I speak of Schopenhauer's notion of weltschmertz, or "world pain" or "world sorrow." Schopenhauer wrote that he felt this universal human pain and loss in the very pores of his own body.
Our need for such an overlay of happiness upon despair and rage and fear ultimately kills us, weighing so heavily upon our being that we are smothered or crushed. We have such an expectation of ourselves to be "normal" and socially acceptable that we repress and smother parts of ourselves that know we are not such happy, well and socially-balanced creatures at all. Some of those who cannot bear themselves or the so-called "culture of happiness" lash out against themselves through suicide or in group settings against those who believe they are having a good time.
In my book I speak of the reality of unhappiness, of the darkness it brings to the doorstep of happiness and all that that implies. If happiness is "normal," then unhappiness is "abnormal," thus to be avoided so that one is not "socially marked," shunned and outcast. Of course, happiness, in perhaps a truer, more inclusive, greater context is able to hold, though not hide, unhappiness within itself. In other words, when one is unhappy, one is unhappy, and one is quite aware of this and able to hold it within one's general context of being as a whole. One is thus able to be unhappy but also to be with it, as it were, rather than having to act out the rage of unacceptance it may create on either oneself or others. The Yijing or Book of Changes notes, seemingly paradoxically, that when one is unhappy, when one is "obstructed," one must be able to be unhappy with "good cheer," which is to say, understanding and acceptance of one's self in this moment. Being aware of oneself in such a "greater context" as this is the perpetual challenge to us all, is it not?
As I initially noted, I forget that of which I was once more seemingly aware: that happiness is not an event, a moment, but, rather, a state of mind. And a state of mind in which one is aware of a larger context of being, of life, than merely what is happening, to oneself in particular in any given moment. Everything passes. We pass, for Christ's sake. In the great scheme of things, we are but a twinkling in our own eye. I myself talk of the reality of the "present moment," of the "here and now," even as the very moment I make note of it, it is no longer here and now but rather there and then. We actually believe that we can even define ourselves as "happy" or "unhappy," while even that is so utterly vague and relative. I am perpetually reminded of my favorite bumpersticker, Are We Having Fun Yet?
It may be a sin but I notice that I have far more trust of anyone who does NOT smile than those who smile all the time, though I also admit that there are those who can do both who are absolutely insane in their darkness, some in the highest places of our society. Still, a little happiness goes a very long way for me. I am also reminded of the handsome, charming, Poe's Masque of Red Death, recognized only after everyone has been mortally infected. Strange that I have wandered down this dark path is speaking of much-cherished Happiness. But there is a cherished place for Darkness, for the hidden, the unspoken, the unknown as well. Some of us head deep into the forest for this exact reason. For the peace, stillness, and quiet of the Darkness. I like to think of the soul as a dark place, like the womb from which we are born and is our first experience of life itself, a time before any happiness or unhappiness, but only perhaps a wholeness.
It may be that our truer purpose is not to find answers but to seek questions.
