Real Moments: Happiness

Real people experience real moments. Yeah, real people experience those picture-perfect moments that you see plastered all over your social media, but first and foremost, they experience real moments.

Real moments with real emotions that can’t always be explained. Real moments with other real people. Real moments with less than perfect circumstances. Real moments like fighting with the person you love the most, or thinking the most depressing thoughts, or doing something that you know you’ll regret.

            So, I’m sharing my real moments, because maybe it will help you realize that everyone has them and people are more similar than we like to think most of the time. So as much as I hope you don’t relate to any of these, I also really hope you do.

Being Happy:

Whew, if you’ve made it through all of those sad embarrassing stories, you’re probably as glad as I am to get here. Life is life, it’s real and it raw, but mostly it’s good. We all have crazy experiences. We go through (excuse my language) some deep crap. But we an always be happy. Sure, I pooped myself in front of one of my best friends, and I was super embarrassed. But I ran an amazing trail race, spent time with this friend, and finished the race within out goal. I was happy too. Sure, I was depressed in Mexico. But I met amazing people, ate amazing tacos, went on amazing vacations, and taught amazing kids. I was still somewhat happy. Happy moments are probably happier when they’re surrounded by some not-so-happy moments. Like you never know how good your mom’s cooking is until you go off to college and have to cook by yourself. But I know that once you go back home, you’re going to be extra grateful for her cooking. It’s kinda the same thing with happiness.

Instead of one story of happiness, here are a bunch of little ones, just so you know that being happy is a lot more frequent and it can ALWAYS happen.

We went to the Twenty-One Pilots concert in Mexico City. This was right in the middle of it all, but I was so happy to be there, and to hear them live. Oh gosh, Tyler and Josh are such homies. (Unrelated story, last night I converted Jake to Costa Vida and Twenty-One Pilots. We stayed up watching Tyler and Josh doing interviews. It was a good time. I was happy.)

I met Jake in a pretty hard time for me, but he started running with me. Now, I don’t know how common it is to convince people to run with you (not common? Just me?) but I was so happy that I did it again.

One time when I went home for a weekend, my dad had a doctor’s appointment. As he was putting on his shoes he made a joke about dying. Then he laughed. I laughed. We all laughed. Then we cried. But we were happy!

I went to Nebraska with my best friend for like a whole week. It was a long drive, and long days, but it was so good. I was happy to be there and explore new places, and spend time with her.

This summer I went swimming with my little brother and sister. Afterwards we went and got ice cream. I had this nasty zit on my face that was all red, but I was so happy.

Obviously, the day I married Jacob was really happy. The man that did the ceremony said he hadn’t seen a couple that was as happy as we were in a long time. I smiled the whole day. I couldn’t stop. My face was like frozen in a smile because Jacob is so good, and marriage is so good, and life is so good.

It really is. Life is good. It can be the same for you, as it is for me. People care about you. You can laugh at things. You can be who you are. You can do the things you love. You can feel God’s love. You can be happy!

            Happiness is real. It’s a real emotion.

I think that people want to belong, they want to relate. But… they don’t want to look too human, too raw, too emotional, too real. So be picture-perfect. Dress up. Have fun. Take pictures and capture those moments, but also be a real person.