What Does It Mean to Be Happy?

Hello all,

Okay, I know the title of the blogpost is a little...abstract and is on the verge of being too obviously philosophical. Bear with me.

So, right now, I am lounging around with some cheap red wine that I just bought from Don Quijote, a grocery story by my work place. It's nothing special but still a nice finish to a long day.  Today was nothing too out of the ordinary, but I did get to meet a couple new faces at the coffee cart I usually frequent in the mornings. I didn't catch their names, but, as I was talking to the barista, they came up and casually started conversations. In the course of 10 minutes, one man revealed his possibly relentless need to discover more and I found out that a woman was familiar with where I went to college up in MA. Pretty awesome. I am finally opening up a lot more nowadays, and I am feeling more and more like the person I had grown to love many moons ago.

Anywho, as I sit here with my red wine, I remember the first time I had ever fully drank wine at all. It was in college (yes, I was a good little high school girl), and my friends and I planned a "Greek" symposium on a weekend night. We planned to drink wine, dress in togas (aka our bedsheets from our twin extra-long beds), and philosophize. So, someone bought us boxes of wine (FRANZIA), we dressed in our ridiculous garb, we gathered in a common room, and our young minds began to answer the philosophical question posed, which was..."WHAT IS HAPPINESS?" I was excited to partake in the event, and throughout the course of the evening, our somewhat intellectual discourse turned into laughter and fun. Unfortunately for me, I had just recovered from a breakup and my mumbling and pathetic answer, I believe, had something to do with reciprocal love. I woke up the next morning feeling physically awful and embarrassed at my answer. My friends, though, just laughed and smiled and offered me water. The years went on, and now I look back fondly.

What's funny is that, this morning, I engaged in a conversation with one of my favorite baristas about the concepts of love and happiness and equality.  Surprisingly, my answer now is not too different from what it was then.  I know that, for me, love is still a component of happiness...but not necessarily in the same way as I thought it to be back then.  Love for family, love for the world, love for a lover...all can make one happy. But to keep happy, I feel you need love for yourself. You need to love yourself and allow yourself to feel joy. And loving yourself means knowing yourself or at least knowing the nature of your being.

And with that...I leave with this gem.

Source

I hope you all love or are growing to love yourselves. And I hope you all realize how much each of you deserve that self-love.

xoxo,

Cassie