Happiness

What is happiness? This age-old question has been asked by pretenscious philosophers since the dawn of human civilization. So please pardon my pretensciousness in asking it. Surely my inadequate spelling abilities will take away from any pretension I might have to pretension.


Seriously, what is happiness? I think happiness, true, deep happiness, which is different than the superficial gladness one might feel from the mere energy of being alive, of being out with friends on a Saturday night, comes from empowerment, and the feeling that one's life is headed in the direction one wants it to be headed in. Those two things are related: When one takes control of ones life, it should cause that life to head in the direction the person in control of it desires.

I think forgiveness is one of the most empowering acts. But in order to forgive others, we must forgive ourselves. This past week, out of the blue, someone who had hurt me deeply over the course of many years apologized, and as I sat there, hugging this person, who had begun to cry, it occurred to me that the reason I could forgive him/her was that I had finally forgiven myself for allowing myself to get hurt.

I am often struck by how precious life is, by how precious it is to be me, sitting here right now, with all my talent and all my potential, and even with all my flaws and my pain. But this knowledge of how precious everything is also fills me with dread, dread that I will waste it, that I will not use it the way I was meant to.

I think forgiving our own mistakes is essential to stop mistakes from becoming abysses. Soon, we will be asking God for forgiveness. How can we ask Him to forgive us, unless we have first forgiven ourselves?