Finding Happiness
One of the most important things I have come to realize, and what has helped me most in attaining a new level of emotional health is, that I was the one who created all my unhappiness.What I have learned is that we, each one of us, are responsible for our own happiness, and that being responsible means making responsible choices. Of course, each person needs to decide for themselves what is responsible, but generally it is something you just know in your gut. It is the least harmful, most loving, most unifying way to respond to life's situations. If you, or anyone else is being harmed by what you do, then you are probably not acting responsibly. That doesn't mean that you are "bad", it just means that there are a few things you just haven't learned yet. The key to learning personal responsibility is found when you are sick and tired of being sick and tired of what life seems to keep handing you. Some of us take longer than others to get to that place. It took me a very long time to get there.
For instance, I was not acting responsibly when I drank so much when my daughter was a child. I could not be emotionally there for her because I was always so wrapped up in my own fears and inner pain. I drank to dull the pain, but it backfired and made the pain much, much worse. I am sorry to say that it took me a long time to realize that drinking and drugs just aren't the answer. I wish I could have discovered all this stuff much sooner, but I just wasn't ready to see it yet. I was too busy blaming others, blaming my unhappy childhood to see it. It was right there, in my heart, in my gut all along, but I suppressed it and ignored it. There was always something that I just had to do or I would just die, and so I had a whole series of abusive and confusing relationships that were generated by my headlong rush to get what I thought that I needed and deserved.
I finally got what I needed, but it was nothing like I thought it was going to be. Fortunately, it is a whole lot better than what I imagined for myself. Nevertheless, I didn't get it until I learned to take personal responsibility for all of my thoughts, feelings and actions.
That is when I learned that we are each responsible for our own happiness. No one can make us happy,
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