This evening I made a startling realization. Seems I let a genie out of the bottle.
I’ve been holding on to something that’s been holding me back. It’s a weirdly counter intuitive concept. Something I’ve been struggling with and have been afraid to let go of…
What if I’m never happy?
What if I’m one of those people who never gets to experience true happiness?
Strangely, the fear of never being happy has been holding me back from being happy.
I’ve been using it as a crutch. What if I’m never happy? Seems that if I’m busy being afraid that I’ll never be happy it doesn’t leave room in my life for actual happiness. Focusing on the negative. Pushing away the happiness and keeping it at an arm’s length. Something of a self-fulfilling prophesy, that’s for sure. Perpetuating a lack of happiness by fearing that maybe I’ll never be happy. Maybe I don’t even deserve to be happy.
Whether or not I deserve happiness isn’t even the point. Really, here’s the rub…if I let go of my fear of never being happy, what am I left with?
I’m left with myself.
What I’ve realized is that if I let go of this fear then I am free to be happy. Then it’s all up to me. And that is a huge responsibility.
No waiting for someone else to make me happy. No waiting for a boyfriend or a spouse or a friend or a dream job or lots of money or whatever else I’ve fantasized might make me happy.
Nope. None of that. Only left with myself and the responsibility to myself to let go and be happy, in spite of my circumstances. Despite the fact that not everything is right in my world nor are the planets aligned. Despite all the crap life has sent my way. Despite the tears of grief that I’ve wept and the losses I’ve endured. Despite the fact that I never did get that one phone call I’d hoped for. Despite all of the things that may have gone wrong or all of the things that might have gone right.
I’m left with me to make myself happy. That’s a tall order.
I am responsible for my own happiness.
Try saying that out loud and really believing it.
It’s like a parallel universe. Unfamiliar territory. And unfamiliar territory is scary even when it’s awesome.
But I’m afraid that I’ve cracked this one open. The genie is out of the bottle.
As I sit here questioning what the hell any of this really means – there are parts of it that are so foreign, so uncomfortable, that I am left wondering if I can ever truly understand what it means to make myself happy. Like my heart and soul are speaking a language that is foreign to me.
But fear not. The immersion method is proven to work when learning new languages and I’m going to learn this one. I will learn to get comfortable with this concept of happiness and will learn to live in this parallel universe.
There’s no turning back now, because the genie is out of the bottle.
Perhaps it’s time to let your genie out of the bottle. There’s no telling what magic this genie can perform in your life. What’s holding you back in your life?