Choosing to be happy? A question for you.

Paco Dennis said:
I find it takes two to tango. So if someone won't forget or forgive a perceived "sin", that is their problem too. I have a few of those. These people hate me, want to kill me and my loved ones, I know them well and they do haunt me at times. But, they perceive the wrongdoing and hate it, while I see it as a strong disagreement, nothing to shoot the person over. But I do admit I have thoughts of violence against those who hate me.
Click to expand...

Hate will eat you alive from the inside out. But thoughts are harmless things unless acted upon, which is where the danger lies.
 
Maybe Jesus should have said "Forgive and Forget our tresspasses as we forgive and forget......" What chutzpah! He didn't say that. He didn't say forget, but aren't there passages where G-d forgets our sins? @Lara? @gruntlabor?
 
Sometimes, we don't "chemically" like a person, look for, thus finding, reasons to back it up.
eta
this doesn't negate the "crime", not looking for excuses
 
Pepper said:
  • Jeremiah 31:34b
    God promises to "forgive" our "iniquity" and "will remember" our "sin no more"
  • Hebrews 8:12
    God says, "For I will be merciful toward their iniquities, and I will remember their sins no more"
Click to expand...
It’s odd that a self proclaimed atheist is looking to the Bible for answers.

We can’t change the things that we’ve done but we can accept them and strive to do things differently in the future.
 
Aunt Bea said:
It’s odd that a self proclaimed atheist is looking to the Bible for answers.

We can’t change the things that we’ve done but we can accept them and strive to do things differently in the future.
Click to expand...
I love the Bible. I think it contains great wisdom. I sometimes go to Psalms to find peace. But most of all, I use the Bible as OTHERS believe it, and I want to understand THEM.

It is the greatest book of Western Civilization. It can't be avoided.
 
Pepper said:
Sometimes, we don't "chemically" like a person, look for, thus finding, reasons to back it up.
eta
this doesn't negate the "crime", not looking for excuses
Click to expand...
I think that has a lot to do with disliking someone. There IS an organic reaction to other types of people. We can't be liked by everyone. But, this thing called "sin" against someone and not forgetting about it is hard for me to understand. My Dad was an alcoholic and ruined our family after Mom died. I never hated him. There has to be some kind of "hate" trigger in some people, probably me too. There is a yin and yang dance of emotions for me. They are always changing so it would be hard to hate intensely. I don't like some foods. They really have a terrible taste. I avoid them. I think I am more in the "there is nothing to forgive or forget" camp. :)
 
Paco Dennis said:
I think that has a lot to do with disliking someone. There IS an organic reaction to other types of people. We can't be liked by everyone. But, this thing called "sin" against someone and not forgetting about it is hard for me to understand. My Dad was an alcoholic and ruined our family after Mom died. I never hated him. There has to be some kind of "hate" trigger in some people, probably me too. There is a yin and yang dance of emotions for me. They are always changing so it would be hard to hate intensely. I don't like some foods. They really have a terrible taste. I avoid them. I think I am more in the "there is nothing to forgive or forget" camp. :)
Click to expand...


"Hate" and "Withholding Forgiveness" are two different things.

Hate is a strong emotion. Withholding forgiveness is a decision.
 
Pepper said:
  • Jeremiah 31:34b
    God promises to "forgive" our "iniquity" and "will remember" our "sin no more"
  • Hebrews 8:12
    God says, "For I will be merciful toward their iniquities, and I will remember their sins no more"
Click to expand...
It would be impossible for an all knowing God to actually forget anything, but he can consciously choose not to remember our sins against us when we repent.

Does God Forget?
 
What an interesting discussion. Everyone's gone deep because it is so I feel free to as well.

I don't think we can choose happiness. We can choose to be optimistic and optimism leads to happiness. I don't know why but people take me for a pessimist when I'm actually an optimist. I think it's because I point out the bad but I actually do that because I am actually (still) naive enough to think we can change the bad. Sounds optimistic to me.

I also find the were you happier younger discussion interesting. Hmm....

Yes and no. I've always had good times and bad times. But only in old age are the aches and pains getting too persistent to ignore and refusing to go away and causing my world and my options to shrink horribly. Shrug. It is what it is. Got to play the hand you're dealt. And find your happiness with the cards in that hand.

My parents were child beating a-holes. Try to be happy stuck in that atmosphere. Yet I often was. I enjoyed playing with my siblings and making up stories for my little sisters and was always nuts about our pet cats who reacted to that adoration (cats so love being treated like the gods they are) by gravitating to me.

Of course, you especially can't blame our tuxedo Snoopy for loving me. My parents didn't believe in fixing and this tom sprayed on my Dad's coat marking his territory as unfixed male cats will. Dad went after the innocent animal with a belt. I threw myself over the cat and took the beating intended for him. That cat loved me 'til the day he died; adored me as much as I adored him. For some strange reason.

Could I have chosen to be happy when that belt was raining down on me instead of the cat even if 10 year olds were astute enough to spout nonsense like you can choose to be happy? Naw. But well I sure spent many a happy hour with Snoopy before and after. Sorry but I have to share this happy moment:

Me 11 years old with Snoopy 1969.JPG

Yes, outspoken atheist me is reading the cat Children's Illustrated Bible Stories. Gotta love it. Note another thing. I'm horribly thin. We were also half-starved because my parents left birth control up to God and had more children than they could afford to feed as a result. This has created lifelong health problems. I'd have to be an absolute idiot to not admit that sucks. Big time.

Thing is how you handle it. Can I choose tai chi? No I cannot. I've been limping since I was 17 and even before that I could not run as fast as other kids (even my fellow half-starved siblings) and likely had juvenile arthritis that went undiagosed as my complaints that my bones hurt as far back as I remember (age 4) were brushed off as growing pains.

I can't choose tai chi, running a mile a day or working out at the gym. I did, despite the pain, when I was younger dance (even though I could never wear heels), play a lot of basketball and swim. Those are now lost to the sands of time.

I'm barely able to walk these days. No more than a few feet without asistance. I walk around inside my small apartment, balancing on furniture and walls. Would not be able to in a large house. Even to take the trash out or get the mail, I have to use my power chair. When I first rented this apartment 11 years ago, I could do those things using my rolling walker. But, well, this is what degenerative and incurable means. (The arthritis is caused by an underlying bone disease.)

That said I suck joy out of every day in any way that I can. Talk to my grandson on Discord. It's why I have a Discord, quite honestly. Enjoy videos, reading, watching birds. Get my kicks where I can.

I got quite a kick recently over a squirrel that frequents my patio and for some reason has decided that it is a good place to store food. I heard a racket on my door and was scared someone was breaking in but peeped out the window to see him across in the grass. Chuckled and reprimanded him for scaring old ladies but when I took the trash out later I found this tucked into my door jamb:

a nut.jpg

That nut was originally on the metal door sill there. Instead of rolling over it and crushing it, I nudged it to where it is in this pic, where the brick meets the cement of the patio floor. Smiling to myself, saying why not let him have his treasure. I have a wrought iron bench on my patio under the window that said squirrel likes to play on and makes a terrible racket when he does (oh, the food I have found in the corners of the windowsill it is under.) I hear that distinctive noise New Year's Eve and yep, sure enough the nut was gone. Seems he came to pick it up for whatever New Year's Eve party he was hosting for his squirrel pals. Again, you've got to love it.

I guess this is my very long way of saying, it's the little things that truly make you happy. I know I went on but I'm optimistically hoping you enjoyed these couple of little stories and are even having a chuckle that I actually took a pic of the squirrel's nut (unfortunately, he's too quick; I've yet to catch him or her not sure why I assume him though he's big so maybe that's why).

The key to happiness/contentment (one and the same in my view; joy is also happiness but, to me, joy is those over the top moments in life like weddings or the birth of your grandchild, etc.; the counterpart to those awful over the top moments when something bad instead of something good happens). Contentment is happiness because it is continual not fleeting. It is the ability to be happy with the little things, to take joy in them.

This is only so much within our control. It is in that it is an outlook on life but it also is not because we cannot always control things. Bird song may be my favorite music but I can't control when the birds sing. Just appreciate it when I hear it. It calms me; it soothes me. I love human music too but even the best of our music falls short of theirs. (Okay, so I can watch bird videos on YouTube but it is purest when not sought out and just there; I'm actually glad that I can't control when the birds sing, which must be why I don't tend to search out bird videos.)

So obviously I suck out a little joy out of little things every day. There is always something to be happy about and most days that gets me through and makes me enjoy life. But there are times outside of my control that upset the apple cart.

When illness flares just as I settle down to watch that video and wind up running to the bathroom desperately swallowing imodium instead and having to take time out for a lie down 'til it takes effect. It's awful boring staring at my bedroom ceiling and horrible "running" (in quotes because herein means hobbling) to the bathroom repeatedly. I cannot choose to be happy in that moment grateful as I am for imodium.

But this too passes and when it does there I am again. Instead of wringing my hands and crying the rest of the day about it, reading, listening to bird song, letting a squirrel amuse me, watching videos and playing my grandma games. I did all my crying and cussing in the moments of dealing with said flare, trust me. But out and over and done with and move on. Life is still there to be enjoyed.

Or replying to my daughter's email or chatting with my grandson on Discord. He chooses Discord; she does email. I have given up on either of them ever doing what I'd prefer and picking up the phone and talking. I could resent them for that or I can enjoy talking with them through the preferred methods of millennials and zoomers. I choose to enjoy their company their way. And that is me choosing happiness.
 
Blaze Duskdreamer said:
What an interesting discussion. Everyone's gone deep because it is so I feel free to as well.

I don't think we can choose happiness. We can choose to be optimistic and optimism leads to happiness. I don't know why but people take me for a pessimist when I'm actually an optimist. I think it's because I point out the bad but I actually do that because I am actually (still) naive enough to think we can change the bad. Sounds optimistic to me.

I also find the were you happier younger discussion interesting. Hmm....

Yes and no. I've always had good times and bad times. But only in old age are the aches and pains getting too persistent to ignore and refusing to go away and causing my world and my options to shrink horribly. Shrug. It is what it is. Got to play the hand you're dealt. And find your happiness with the cards in that hand.

My parents were child beating a-holes. Try to be happy stuck in that atmosphere. Yet I often was. I enjoyed playing with my siblings and making up stories for my little sisters and was always nuts about our pet cats who reacted to that adoration (cats so love being treated like the gods they are) by gravitating to me.

Of course, you especially can't blame our tuxedo Snoopy for loving me. My parents didn't believe in fixing and this tom sprayed on my Dad's coat marking his territory as unfixed male cats will. Dad went after the innocent animal with a belt. I threw myself over the cat and took the beating intended for him. That cat loved me 'til the day he died; adored me as much as I adored him. For some strange reason.

Could I have chosen to be happy when that belt was raining down on me instead of the cat even if 10 year olds were astute enough to spout nonsense like you can choose to be happy? Naw. But well I sure spent many a happy hour with Snoopy before and after. Sorry but I have to share this happy moment:

View attachment 393577

Yes, outspoken atheist me is reading the cat Children's Illustrated Bible Stories. Gotta love it. Note another thing. I'm horribly thin. We were also half-starved because my parents left birth control up to God and had more children than they could afford to feed as a result. This has created lifelong health problems. I'd have to be an absolute idiot to not admit that sucks. Big time.

Thing is how you handle it. Can I choose tai chi? No I cannot. I've been limping since I was 17 and even before that I could not run as fast as other kids (even my fellow half-starved siblings) and likely had juvenile arthritis that went undiagosed as my complaints that my bones hurt as far back as I remember (age 4) were brushed off as growing pains.

I can't choose tai chi, running a mile a day or working out at the gym. I did, despite the pain, when I was younger dance (even though I could never wear heels), play a lot of basketball and swim. Those are now lost to the sands of time.

I'm barely able to walk these days. No more than a few feet without asistance. I walk around inside my small apartment, balancing on furniture and walls. Would not be able to in a large house. Even to take the trash out or get the mail, I have to use my power chair. When I first rented this apartment 11 years ago, I could do those things using my rolling walker. But, well, this is what degenerative and incurable means. (The arthritis is caused by an underlying bone disease.)

That said I suck joy out of every day in any way that I can. Talk to my grandson on Discord. It's why I have a Discord, quite honestly. Enjoy videos, reading, watching birds. Get my kicks where I can.

I got quite a kick recently over a squirrel that frequents my patio and for some reason has decided that it is a good place to store food. I heard a racket on my door and was scared someone was breaking in but peeped out the window to see him across in the grass. Chuckled and reprimanded him for scaring old ladies but when I took the trash out later I found this tucked into my door jamb:

View attachment 393581

That nut was originally on the metal door sill there. Instead of rolling over it and crushing it, I nudged it to where it is in this pic, where the brick meets the cement of the patio floor. Smiling to myself, saying why not let him have his treasure. I have a wrought iron bench on my patio under the window that said squirrel likes to play on and makes a terrible racket when he does (oh, the food I have found in the corners of the windowsill it is under.) I hear that distinctive noise New Year's Eve and yep, sure enough the nut was gone. Seems he came to pick it up for whatever New Year's Eve party he was hosting for his squirrel pals. Again, you've got to love it.

I guess this is my very long way of saying, it's the little things that truly make you happy. I know I went on but I'm optimistically hoping you enjoyed these couple of little stories and are even having a chuckle that I actually took a pic of the squirrel's nut (unfortunately, he's too quick; I've yet to catch him or her not sure why I assume him though he's big so maybe that's why).

The key to happiness/contentment (one and the same in my view; joy is also happiness but, to me, joy is those over the top moments in life like weddings or the birth of your grandchild, etc.; the counterpart to those awful over the top moments when something bad instead of something good happens). Contentment is happiness because it is continual not fleeting. It is the ability to be happy with the little things, to take joy in them.

This is only so much within our control. It is in that it is an outlook on life but it also is not because we cannot always control things. Bird song may be my favorite music but I can't control when the birds sing. Just appreciate it when I hear it. It calms me; it soothes me. I love human music too but even the best of our music falls short of theirs. (Okay, so I can watch bird videos on YouTube but it is purest when not sought out and just there; I'm actually glad that I can't control when the birds sing, which must be why I don't tend to search out bird videos.)

So obviously I suck out a little joy out of little things every day. There is always something to be happy about and most days that gets me through and makes me enjoy life. But there are times outside of my control that upset the apple cart.

When illness flares just as I settle down to watch that video and wind up running to the bathroom desperately swallowing imodium instead and having to take time out for a lie down 'til it takes effect. It's awful boring staring at my bedroom ceiling and horrible "running" (in quotes because herein means hobbling) to the bathroom repeatedly. I cannot choose to be happy in that moment grateful as I am for imodium.

But this too passes and when it does there I am again. Instead of wringing my hands and crying the rest of the day about it, reading, listening to bird song, letting a squirrel amuse me, watching videos and playing my grandma games. I did all my crying and cussing in the moments of dealing with said flare, trust me. But out and over and done with and move on. Life is still there to be enjoyed.

Or replying to my daughter's email or chatting with my grandson on Discord. He chooses Discord; she does email. I have given up on either of them ever doing what I'd prefer and picking up the phone and talking. I could resent them for that or I can enjoy talking with them through the preferred methods of millennials and zoomers. I choose to enjoy their company their way. And that is me choosing happiness.
Click to expand...


Lovely post. Thank you for making my day even better.
 
Blaze Duskdreamer said:
What an interesting discussion. Everyone's gone deep because it is so I feel free to as well.

I don't think we can choose happiness. We can choose to be optimistic and optimism leads to happiness. I don't know why but people take me for a pessimist when I'm actually an optimist. I think it's because I point out the bad but I actually do that because I am actually (still) naive enough to think we can change the bad. Sounds optimistic to me.

I also find the were you happier younger discussion interesting. Hmm....

Yes and no. I've always had good times and bad times. But only in old age are the aches and pains getting too persistent to ignore and refusing to go away and causing my world and my options to shrink horribly. Shrug. It is what it is. Got to play the hand you're dealt. And find your happiness with the cards in that hand.

My parents were child beating a-holes. Try to be happy stuck in that atmosphere. Yet I often was. I enjoyed playing with my siblings and making up stories for my little sisters and was always nuts about our pet cats who reacted to that adoration (cats so love being treated like the gods they are) by gravitating to me.

Of course, you especially can't blame our tuxedo Snoopy for loving me. My parents didn't believe in fixing and this tom sprayed on my Dad's coat marking his territory as unfixed male cats will. Dad went after the innocent animal with a belt. I threw myself over the cat and took the beating intended for him. That cat loved me 'til the day he died; adored me as much as I adored him. For some strange reason.

Could I have chosen to be happy when that belt was raining down on me instead of the cat even if 10 year olds were astute enough to spout nonsense like you can choose to be happy? Naw. But well I sure spent many a happy hour with Snoopy before and after. Sorry but I have to share this happy moment:

View attachment 393577

Yes, outspoken atheist me is reading the cat Children's Illustrated Bible Stories. Gotta love it. Note another thing. I'm horribly thin. We were also half-starved because my parents left birth control up to God and had more children than they could afford to feed as a result. This has created lifelong health problems. I'd have to be an absolute idiot to not admit that sucks. Big time.

Thing is how you handle it. Can I choose tai chi? No I cannot. I've been limping since I was 17 and even before that I could not run as fast as other kids (even my fellow half-starved siblings) and likely had juvenile arthritis that went undiagosed as my complaints that my bones hurt as far back as I remember (age 4) were brushed off as growing pains.

I can't choose tai chi, running a mile a day or working out at the gym. I did, despite the pain, when I was younger dance (even though I could never wear heels), play a lot of basketball and swim. Those are now lost to the sands of time.

I'm barely able to walk these days. No more than a few feet without asistance. I walk around inside my small apartment, balancing on furniture and walls. Would not be able to in a large house. Even to take the trash out or get the mail, I have to use my power chair. When I first rented this apartment 11 years ago, I could do those things using my rolling walker. But, well, this is what degenerative and incurable means. (The arthritis is caused by an underlying bone disease.)

That said I suck joy out of every day in any way that I can. Talk to my grandson on Discord. It's why I have a Discord, quite honestly. Enjoy videos, reading, watching birds. Get my kicks where I can.

I got quite a kick recently over a squirrel that frequents my patio and for some reason has decided that it is a good place to store food. I heard a racket on my door and was scared someone was breaking in but peeped out the window to see him across in the grass. Chuckled and reprimanded him for scaring old ladies but when I took the trash out later I found this tucked into my door jamb:

View attachment 393581

That nut was originally on the metal door sill there. Instead of rolling over it and crushing it, I nudged it to where it is in this pic, where the brick meets the cement of the patio floor. Smiling to myself, saying why not let him have his treasure. I have a wrought iron bench on my patio under the window that said squirrel likes to play on and makes a terrible racket when he does (oh, the food I have found in the corners of the windowsill it is under.) I hear that distinctive noise New Year's Eve and yep, sure enough the nut was gone. Seems he came to pick it up for whatever New Year's Eve party he was hosting for his squirrel pals. Again, you've got to love it.

I guess this is my very long way of saying, it's the little things that truly make you happy. I know I went on but I'm optimistically hoping you enjoyed these couple of little stories and are even having a chuckle that I actually took a pic of the squirrel's nut (unfortunately, he's too quick; I've yet to catch him or her not sure why I assume him though he's big so maybe that's why).

The key to happiness/contentment (one and the same in my view; joy is also happiness but, to me, joy is those over the top moments in life like weddings or the birth of your grandchild, etc.; the counterpart to those awful over the top moments when something bad instead of something good happens). Contentment is happiness because it is continual not fleeting. It is the ability to be happy with the little things, to take joy in them.

This is only so much within our control. It is in that it is an outlook on life but it also is not because we cannot always control things. Bird song may be my favorite music but I can't control when the birds sing. Just appreciate it when I hear it. It calms me; it soothes me. I love human music too but even the best of our music falls short of theirs. (Okay, so I can watch bird videos on YouTube but it is purest when not sought out and just there; I'm actually glad that I can't control when the birds sing, which must be why I don't tend to search out bird videos.)

So obviously I suck out a little joy out of little things every day. There is always something to be happy about and most days that gets me through and makes me enjoy life. But there are times outside of my control that upset the apple cart.

When illness flares just as I settle down to watch that video and wind up running to the bathroom desperately swallowing imodium instead and having to take time out for a lie down 'til it takes effect. It's awful boring staring at my bedroom ceiling and horrible "running" (in quotes because herein means hobbling) to the bathroom repeatedly. I cannot choose to be happy in that moment grateful as I am for imodium.

But this too passes and when it does there I am again. Instead of wringing my hands and crying the rest of the day about it, reading, listening to bird song, letting a squirrel amuse me, watching videos and playing my grandma games. I did all my crying and cussing in the moments of dealing with said flare, trust me. But out and over and done with and move on. Life is still there to be enjoyed.

Or replying to my daughter's email or chatting with my grandson on Discord. He chooses Discord; she does email. I have given up on either of them ever doing what I'd prefer and picking up the phone and talking. I could resent them for that or I can enjoy talking with them through the preferred methods of millennials and zoomers. I choose to enjoy their company their way. And that is me choosing happiness.
Click to expand...

It was good to get all that out - thanks for sharing. I had a father much like the one you describe. But then, his father was even worse, so it all gets passed down.

You're looking for happiness in the little things, and that's where it's usually found. When I look back, some of my best memories are of the small unplanned moments, while I often struggle to recall some of the big events.

You wrote, "we cannot always control things." I know. There is actually very little we can control, except maybe how we react to life - and even that can be a challenge.
 
Blaze Duskdreamer said:
What an interesting discussion. Everyone's gone deep because it is so I feel free to as well.

I don't think we can choose happiness. We can choose to be optimistic and optimism leads to happiness. I don't know why but people take me for a pessimist when I'm actually an optimist. I think it's because I point out the bad but I actually do that because I am actually (still) naive enough to think we can change the bad. Sounds optimistic to me.

I also find the were you happier younger discussion interesting. Hmm....

Yes and no. I've always had good times and bad times. But only in old age are the aches and pains getting too persistent to ignore and refusing to go away and causing my world and my options to shrink horribly. Shrug. It is what it is. Got to play the hand you're dealt. And find your happiness with the cards in that hand.

My parents were child beating a-holes. Try to be happy stuck in that atmosphere. Yet I often was. I enjoyed playing with my siblings and making up stories for my little sisters and was always nuts about our pet cats who reacted to that adoration (cats so love being treated like the gods they are) by gravitating to me.

Of course, you especially can't blame our tuxedo Snoopy for loving me. My parents didn't believe in fixing and this tom sprayed on my Dad's coat marking his territory as unfixed male cats will. Dad went after the innocent animal with a belt. I threw myself over the cat and took the beating intended for him. That cat loved me 'til the day he died; adored me as much as I adored him. For some strange reason.

Could I have chosen to be happy when that belt was raining down on me instead of the cat even if 10 year olds were astute enough to spout nonsense like you can choose to be happy? Naw. But well I sure spent many a happy hour with Snoopy before and after. Sorry but I have to share this happy moment:

View attachment 393577

Yes, outspoken atheist me is reading the cat Children's Illustrated Bible Stories. Gotta love it. Note another thing. I'm horribly thin. We were also half-starved because my parents left birth control up to God and had more children than they could afford to feed as a result. This has created lifelong health problems. I'd have to be an absolute idiot to not admit that sucks. Big time.

Thing is how you handle it. Can I choose tai chi? No I cannot. I've been limping since I was 17 and even before that I could not run as fast as other kids (even my fellow half-starved siblings) and likely had juvenile arthritis that went undiagosed as my complaints that my bones hurt as far back as I remember (age 4) were brushed off as growing pains.

I can't choose tai chi, running a mile a day or working out at the gym. I did, despite the pain, when I was younger dance (even though I could never wear heels), play a lot of basketball and swim. Those are now lost to the sands of time.

I'm barely able to walk these days. No more than a few feet without asistance. I walk around inside my small apartment, balancing on furniture and walls. Would not be able to in a large house. Even to take the trash out or get the mail, I have to use my power chair. When I first rented this apartment 11 years ago, I could do those things using my rolling walker. But, well, this is what degenerative and incurable means. (The arthritis is caused by an underlying bone disease.)

That said I suck joy out of every day in any way that I can. Talk to my grandson on Discord. It's why I have a Discord, quite honestly. Enjoy videos, reading, watching birds. Get my kicks where I can.

I got quite a kick recently over a squirrel that frequents my patio and for some reason has decided that it is a good place to store food. I heard a racket on my door and was scared someone was breaking in but peeped out the window to see him across in the grass. Chuckled and reprimanded him for scaring old ladies but when I took the trash out later I found this tucked into my door jamb:

View attachment 393581

That nut was originally on the metal door sill there. Instead of rolling over it and crushing it, I nudged it to where it is in this pic, where the brick meets the cement of the patio floor. Smiling to myself, saying why not let him have his treasure. I have a wrought iron bench on my patio under the window that said squirrel likes to play on and makes a terrible racket when he does (oh, the food I have found in the corners of the windowsill it is under.) I hear that distinctive noise New Year's Eve and yep, sure enough the nut was gone. Seems he came to pick it up for whatever New Year's Eve party he was hosting for his squirrel pals. Again, you've got to love it.

I guess this is my very long way of saying, it's the little things that truly make you happy. I know I went on but I'm optimistically hoping you enjoyed these couple of little stories and are even having a chuckle that I actually took a pic of the squirrel's nut (unfortunately, he's too quick; I've yet to catch him or her not sure why I assume him though he's big so maybe that's why).

The key to happiness/contentment (one and the same in my view; joy is also happiness but, to me, joy is those over the top moments in life like weddings or the birth of your grandchild, etc.; the counterpart to those awful over the top moments when something bad instead of something good happens). Contentment is happiness because it is continual not fleeting. It is the ability to be happy with the little things, to take joy in them.

This is only so much within our control. It is in that it is an outlook on life but it also is not because we cannot always control things. Bird song may be my favorite music but I can't control when the birds sing. Just appreciate it when I hear it. It calms me; it soothes me. I love human music too but even the best of our music falls short of theirs. (Okay, so I can watch bird videos on YouTube but it is purest when not sought out and just there; I'm actually glad that I can't control when the birds sing, which must be why I don't tend to search out bird videos.)

So obviously I suck out a little joy out of little things every day. There is always something to be happy about and most days that gets me through and makes me enjoy life. But there are times outside of my control that upset the apple cart.

When illness flares just as I settle down to watch that video and wind up running to the bathroom desperately swallowing imodium instead and having to take time out for a lie down 'til it takes effect. It's awful boring staring at my bedroom ceiling and horrible "running" (in quotes because herein means hobbling) to the bathroom repeatedly. I cannot choose to be happy in that moment grateful as I am for imodium.

But this too passes and when it does there I am again. Instead of wringing my hands and crying the rest of the day about it, reading, listening to bird song, letting a squirrel amuse me, watching videos and playing my grandma games. I did all my crying and cussing in the moments of dealing with said flare, trust me. But out and over and done with and move on. Life is still there to be enjoyed.

Or replying to my daughter's email or chatting with my grandson on Discord. He chooses Discord; she does email. I have given up on either of them ever doing what I'd prefer and picking up the phone and talking. I could resent them for that or I can enjoy talking with them through the preferred methods of millennials and zoomers. I ch.oose to enjoy their company their way. And that is me choosing happiness.
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Thank you. That was so good. I hope you keep posting.
 
Blaze Duskdreamer said:
What an interesting discussion. Everyone's gone deep because it is so I feel free to as well.

I don't think we can choose happiness. We can choose to be optimistic and optimism leads to happiness. I don't know why but people take me for a pessimist when I'm actually an optimist. I think it's because I point out the bad but I actually do that because I am actually (still) naive enough to think we can change the bad. Sounds optimistic to me.

I also find the were you happier younger discussion interesting. Hmm....

Yes and no. I've always had good times and bad times. But only in old age are the aches and pains getting too persistent to ignore and refusing to go away and causing my world and my options to shrink horribly. Shrug. It is what it is. Got to play the hand you're dealt. And find your happiness with the cards in that hand.

My parents were child beating a-holes. Try to be happy stuck in that atmosphere. Yet I often was. I enjoyed playing with my siblings and making up stories for my little sisters and was always nuts about our pet cats who reacted to that adoration (cats so love being treated like the gods they are) by gravitating to me.

Of course, you especially can't blame our tuxedo Snoopy for loving me. My parents didn't believe in fixing and this tom sprayed on my Dad's coat marking his territory as unfixed male cats will. Dad went after the innocent animal with a belt. I threw myself over the cat and took the beating intended for him. That cat loved me 'til the day he died; adored me as much as I adored him. For some strange reason.

Could I have chosen to be happy when that belt was raining down on me instead of the cat even if 10 year olds were astute enough to spout nonsense like you can choose to be happy? Naw. But well I sure spent many a happy hour with Snoopy before and after. Sorry but I have to share this happy moment:

View attachment 393577

Yes, outspoken atheist me is reading the cat Children's Illustrated Bible Stories. Gotta love it. Note another thing. I'm horribly thin. We were also half-starved because my parents left birth control up to God and had more children than they could afford to feed as a result. This has created lifelong health problems. I'd have to be an absolute idiot to not admit that sucks. Big time.

Thing is how you handle it. Can I choose tai chi? No I cannot. I've been limping since I was 17 and even before that I could not run as fast as other kids (even my fellow half-starved siblings) and likely had juvenile arthritis that went undiagosed as my complaints that my bones hurt as far back as I remember (age 4) were brushed off as growing pains.

I can't choose tai chi, running a mile a day or working out at the gym. I did, despite the pain, when I was younger dance (even though I could never wear heels), play a lot of basketball and swim. Those are now lost to the sands of time.

I'm barely able to walk these days. No more than a few feet without asistance. I walk around inside my small apartment, balancing on furniture and walls. Would not be able to in a large house. Even to take the trash out or get the mail, I have to use my power chair. When I first rented this apartment 11 years ago, I could do those things using my rolling walker. But, well, this is what degenerative and incurable means. (The arthritis is caused by an underlying bone disease.)

That said I suck joy out of every day in any way that I can. Talk to my grandson on Discord. It's why I have a Discord, quite honestly. Enjoy videos, reading, watching birds. Get my kicks where I can.

I got quite a kick recently over a squirrel that frequents my patio and for some reason has decided that it is a good place to store food. I heard a racket on my door and was scared someone was breaking in but peeped out the window to see him across in the grass. Chuckled and reprimanded him for scaring old ladies but when I took the trash out later I found this tucked into my door jamb:

View attachment 393581

That nut was originally on the metal door sill there. Instead of rolling over it and crushing it, I nudged it to where it is in this pic, where the brick meets the cement of the patio floor. Smiling to myself, saying why not let him have his treasure. I have a wrought iron bench on my patio under the window that said squirrel likes to play on and makes a terrible racket when he does (oh, the food I have found in the corners of the windowsill it is under.) I hear that distinctive noise New Year's Eve and yep, sure enough the nut was gone. Seems he came to pick it up for whatever New Year's Eve party he was hosting for his squirrel pals. Again, you've got to love it.

I guess this is my very long way of saying, it's the little things that truly make you happy. I know I went on but I'm optimistically hoping you enjoyed these couple of little stories and are even having a chuckle that I actually took a pic of the squirrel's nut (unfortunately, he's too quick; I've yet to catch him or her not sure why I assume him though he's big so maybe that's why).

The key to happiness/contentment (one and the same in my view; joy is also happiness but, to me, joy is those over the top moments in life like weddings or the birth of your grandchild, etc.; the counterpart to those awful over the top moments when something bad instead of something good happens). Contentment is happiness because it is continual not fleeting. It is the ability to be happy with the little things, to take joy in them.

This is only so much within our control. It is in that it is an outlook on life but it also is not because we cannot always control things. Bird song may be my favorite music but I can't control when the birds sing. Just appreciate it when I hear it. It calms me; it soothes me. I love human music too but even the best of our music falls short of theirs. (Okay, so I can watch bird videos on YouTube but it is purest when not sought out and just there; I'm actually glad that I can't control when the birds sing, which must be why I don't tend to search out bird videos.)

So obviously I suck out a little joy out of little things every day. There is always something to be happy about and most days that gets me through and makes me enjoy life. But there are times outside of my control that upset the apple cart.

When illness flares just as I settle down to watch that video and wind up running to the bathroom desperately swallowing imodium instead and having to take time out for a lie down 'til it takes effect. It's awful boring staring at my bedroom ceiling and horrible "running" (in quotes because herein means hobbling) to the bathroom repeatedly. I cannot choose to be happy in that moment grateful as I am for imodium.

But this too passes and when it does there I am again. Instead of wringing my hands and crying the rest of the day about it, reading, listening to bird song, letting a squirrel amuse me, watching videos and playing my grandma games. I did all my crying and cussing in the moments of dealing with said flare, trust me. But out and over and done with and move on. Life is still there to be enjoyed.

Or replying to my daughter's email or chatting with my grandson on Discord. He chooses Discord; she does email. I have given up on either of them ever doing what I'd prefer and picking up the phone and talking. I could resent them for that or I can enjoy talking with them through the preferred methods of millennials and zoomers. I choose to enjoy their company their way. And that is me choosing happiness.
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That's a beautiful post. You've brought so much meaning to this thread. Thanks for participating. Sharing. :giggle:
 

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