For me it has always been easy to put off happiness and think "Well I will be happy when this happens or this happens" instead of being happy now. In high school I thought once I got to college I would be happy, but when I got here I wasn't much happier at all. If anything I was worse. I felt alone and like I had no friends. It really took this class and a little bit of Epictetus for me to change my mindset.
When we started talking about Stoicism and Epictetus at first I thought it was kind of silly for us to ignore our "bad" emotions, but then I came to create my own view of what he had to say in The Handbook. I really just thought about how if I don't choose to be happy and work to be happy then I will never be happy. I cannot choose what bad things I experience, but I can choose how I react to them. I can learn to enjoy the small things like the smell of freshly mowed grass and the sun on my skin. I realized I need to learn to enjoy those things because tomorrow is most certainly not guaranteed and that I was taking life for granted every second that passed me by. I have already lost my dad at a young age and new that I needed to appreciate my family. I had been working on this for years now and have come far, but Stoicism opened my eyes to new things that I was not appreciating. I learned that I need to appreciate what I have now because I have little control over many things.
Accepting what I cannot change and having the power to change what I can is a big thing to most people, including me. So thank you Dr. Rider and Epictetus for opening up my eyes to a beautiful world.
You make such a great point that you must choose to be happy in order to be happy, along with other factors. I think that the culture we live in encourages us too much to look towards the future in order to make plans rather than encouraging us as young adults to enjoy the life we are living now as much. Acceptance of reality is a great way to change your attitude towards life, because if we can accept the cards we are dealt, then we can begin to make the most of them moving forward.
ReplyDeleteI love this! I relate to your situation because I use to take every bad thing and dwell on it. I never really looked at the positive side of things, because it is just easier to complain. It wasn't till I think my junior year of high school when I started flipping how I viewed the world. Now, I am so happy in my life and other people even compliment me on how uplifting I am in their life, which means the world to me. I don't take it to give myself a big head, I love it because if you are not waking up and trying to make at least one persons life better, then what is the point? I liked learning about Epictetus as well because it feels good to have a purpose in life.
ReplyDeleteIn our consumerism society we often forget that material things do not make us happy. It's a good point to make that your mindset is what allows you to find happiness. Trying to find happiness even in the struggles and the hard moments of life is what allows you to be content no matter what you are going through.
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