the happy skill

I’m catching up on blog reading and I just got to Chrissy’s post about “perfection” and dealing with the “lulls” in life. She just recently finished her MLIS too (in addition to several other accomplishments). I like how she questions “well, what’s next? Is this it?” because I’ve done a lot of this myself lately. We spend a lot of time trying to accomplish things and despite how rewarding the achievement may feel there’s this initial coming down period afterwards. It kind of reminds you that the best part is often the process, not the result. I think sometimes we grow up thinking that happiness is a state of being. Something that just happens but only after a certain mixture of ingredients or specific variables have been combined. The media certainly makes us feels this way. Buy this, be this, look like this. Maybe it’s better not to think about happiness as a state, but as a learned skill that has to be practiced. Continuously. Not that I’m an expert on this but it would seem to make more sense if we thought of it that way more often so we’re not constantly looking for something external to create that specific state of being. On the other hand, it’s also very likely that it’s almost midnight and I should probably go to bed. Either that or waaaaay to many of those Buddhist focused self-help books.