Being Happy is Hard Work

I would consider myself a very happy person. That is not to say that has always been the case; I, like many others, have struggled with bouts of depression. Unlike many others however, I was fortunate enough to go through therapy, which was completely life changing and I will forever be grateful to my wonderful therapist. I spent the first year post-therapy bathing in a blissful state of contentment; the relief of not having to live with the depression of previous years was astounding, and I couldn’t believe how lucky I was. The work done by myself and my therapist in those sessions cannot be undone, and the tools she gave me will serve me for the rest of my life. However, only in the past year or so have I come to the realisation that, despite having dealt with and confronting the things that make me unhappy, remaining happy is still hard work.

Going through therapy and coming out the other side does not mean you are ‘cured.’ Happiness is a life’s work, and the sources of our happiness may shift and change throughout the course of our lives. Happiness may also, obviously, be limited by external factors, beyond our control, such as grief or heartbreak. Aside from external causes, being happy is a basic need. Our understanding of mental health has increased significantly in my lifetime, and I feel immensely lucky to have grown up within a society that understands and acknowledges people’s problems. However, the trends witnessed in the beauty and health industry, have now transcended into the mental health industry too, selling us an ideal which, from its very core, transmits a message of inadequacy. The birth of social media has widened our understanding of mental health issues and given voice to those struggling. But despite the increased mental health awareness that social media has enabled, its negative impact is not to be ignored.

Few people would claim that social media has a 100% positive impact on our mental health, and I am not trying to make any ground-breaking observations here. Aside from the obvious negative toll that trawling through social media sites can have on our happiness (FOMO, cyberbullying, addiction, etc.), I have recently found myself profoundly threatened by the constant pressure on social media to be happy, and, more pressingly, how to achieve it. As a 20-something female, my algorithm is, unfortunately, predominately filled with ‘what I eat in a day’ and ‘updated workout routine’ videos. I try, I really try, to flick past these videos when they appear on my Instagram page, but in moments of weakness, I feed off them, inhaling every second of green juice and Skims. And whilst watching these videos, a little voice in the back of my mind whispers “if you live like those girls, you’ll be happy.” So off I go; I stretch, I journal, I blend, I smoothie bowl, I manifest, I multivitamin, I overnight-oat, all the while avidly awaiting the results of my new life. And yet I feel nothing, no sense of self-growth or self-love, in fact, what I am left with is an immense feeling of defect, because, and it may come as a surprise, I am fundamentally not one of those girls, nor will I ever be. In fact, I’m not even so sure that those girls are any happier than the rest of us. Safe to say the wool of social media has very much been pulled over my eyes.

I can only feel disappointed in myself for falling, time and time again, for the immense lies that social media has manged to spin us. I am an intelligent, therapized, self-aware young woman and yet, off I go, down the rabbit hole once again. Because what I have learnt, every time I have found nothing but disappointment and vapidness in trying to employ the supposed habits of an influencer, is that only I can know what makes me tick. Not once did my brilliant therapist advise me to develop a 12-step skincare routine, or to force myself to journal. In fact, she never ‘forced’ me to do anything; the overriding message I took away from our sessions is that it is up to me to discover which activities genuinely make me feel happy and whole. To name a few: the first day of summer when I can officially tell anyone who’ll listen, '“it’s the first day of summer!”, being reminded of a childhood TV show that I haven’t thought about in over a decade, laughing with my friends until my sides hurt and I can’t breathe. Although a bit (very) cringe, the common theme here is simplicity; none of these activities or practices require much time, or planning, or need to document on Instagram. I truly believe that some of the most simple moments, conversations and activities are what makes us happiest.

As a self-proclaimed optimist, I am aware that this article does not sound particularly positive. My intention here is not to depict happiness as an unattainable goal, or at least one that is so difficult to obtain that it’s hardly worth it. Since entering my twenties, I have found that a constant stridence for happiness is not, by any means, an unachievable feat. It is however, a complex and ever-evolving journey that we must all embark on, allowing ourselves the space and empathy to do so. We all deserve happiness, and the way in which we seek and receive it differs from person to person, and nobody can tell you how you can be happy, especially unqualified social media influencers, or me, for that matter. My intention now is to give myself the time and care to rediscover the things that truly make me happy, and not berate myself for not being able to mimic the lives of others, or for feeling just a bit crap when I do.