Here is a question for you to ponder; who is in charge of your happiness? It may seem like a simple and straight forward question, but if you look at any relationship, be it friendship, acquaintance, or marriage, it might get a little more difficult. It may not be so hard when looking at yourself for I think that if we all were singular entities living alone, we could all agree that we are in charge of our own happiness. However, when you throw another person into the mix, any person, the equation seems to change. We forget about our own happiness and start to focus on the other person and their happiness. We think that we can somehow affect their happiness and their satisfaction in a given relationship. Perhaps we can to a certain extent, but in the end, the only person who can truly make that other person in our life happy is themselves. But why? Why can't we affect another person's happiness to a large extent? For the most part, it is because we can't alter their feelings, we can't alter their perceptions of life and relationships, and we can't fundamentally change the way they live. We all have our feelings, perceptions, and in a sense our own reality that we live in. We can change how we feel about certain people, events, and objects, but they can't fundamentally change us. They may have a slight effect on us, but not in a way that will change whether we are happy or sad. They may make us feel good for a time, lift our spirits, seemingly make problems temporarily disappear, but at the end of the day, when we lay our heads down on our pillow to sleep, we still need to come to terms with our own feelings, our own sadness or happiness, and it is up to us in the end whether or not we change how we feel. It seems so easy, just change how happy or sad we are, yet many times it is much more difficult than that with those feelings rooted deep within our subconscious and not so easy to just flip a switch from happy to sad. In order to fundamentally change how happy or sad we are, we need to look deep within ourselves to find what causes us to be happy or sad, and in doing so, eliminate or change those aspects in our lives that make us sad and feed and nourish that which makes us happy. To think we can do that in a large way for someone else is a hoax. Yet many of us think that we can affect others feelings in a way that will change them.
Think of a comedy show. If you have ever been to one, it is hard not to laugh along with others in the room, even if we don't necessarily find a joke funny. Laughter is infectious. It makes us feel better for while, relieves stress for a while, but at the end of the day when the show is over and there is no more laughter, we still have to deal with ourselves and our feelings that preceded the show and most likely that entire day. I am sure that there have been many instances when people have gone to a comedy show, laughed their proverbial asses off, and yet the next day feel essentially the same as they did the day before. They may be happy, they may be sad, but the comedy show did not fundamentally alter their state of mind, their happiness or their sadness. It might have alleviated sadness for a time, but it can't get rid of it permanently. We can only look to ourselves to do that. Perhaps one of the biggest reasons that we can't fundamentally alter the way another person feels is because we aren't them. I know it sounds overly simplistic, but think about it, we don't have their base of experiences, their feelings, their thoughts, their temperament, anything. We may be similar in ways to them, but we aren't them, and as such any attempt we make to try and alter the way they feel will fall drastically short. Yet, for all this talk about not being able to alter the way a person feels in terms of happiness or sadness, there perhaps is a way we can help them. We can seek to understand their feelings through conversation, to perhaps understand why they are sad, and if it seems appropriate, offer suggestions as to what we think might help them out of their sadness. Obviously if someone is happy, they don't necessarily need our help, but it still helps to understand what makes them happy or sad, and seek to help them perpetuate that happiness or alleviate that sadness. In any type of relationship, that is the best we can do. We may be able to do things that help take the burden off of them so they can focus on themselves a little more, or perhaps we can engage in activities that will bring them a sense of happiness; or at least foster that happiness within them so they can take charge and feed it themselves.
To me, the greatest thing we can do in any relationship, especially when it comes to happiness and sadness, is to listen. In fact, it goes beyond happiness or sadness, but to every aspect of our lives. The more we listen in a relationship, seek to understand a person; their thoughts, feelings, ambitions, then the more we can help them and in turn they can help us. We can never change a person, but we can help them to change themselves. In looking at relationships in such a light, we must also look at ourselves and realize that we are in charge of our own feelings, whether we are happy or sad, or anything else that we might feel. If we place the burden of our feelings on someone else, it is not fair to them, and in turn not fair to us. If we think that another person, just by their actions will make us happy or sad, we are wrong. The only way we can change our feelings is to look a the root of where those feelings are coming from and see what we can do to alter that base. Perhaps an extended period of sadness is due to an event that occurred in our past or is due to the amount of stress we allow to build up within us. To think that another person can change that for us is ludicrous and will only doom a given relationships to failure. Why do most marriages fail? There are a slew of reasons, but part of that is because we place the onus of our happiness or sadness on our partner in life. We think that they must be doing something wrong if we are not happy. Quite the contrary. It is us who has changed in a way that has altered our happiness or sadness and the only person who can change that is us. Here is the kicker, we must be willing to change something in our lives if we are to alter our feelings. We can't just go through the same routine, day in and day out and expect different outcomes. That is insanity. We must thoroughly look at our lives and change whatever it is that is making us unhappy and sad and increase what makes us happy. The more we can look at others and seek to understand and help instead of change and alter, the more we can move our relationships to a different level, a deeper level. That realization must come from both parties in a relationship or nothing will work and that relationships will eventually fail. That isn't to say we must not try to help the other person realize this, but we can't make them do anything. We can't make others happy in a long term sense. We can only make ourselves happy and in terms help other to make themselves happy.
No comments:
Post a Comment