Is being happy the new black?
It’s quite a simple premise for 100 days you take note of of something that made you happy, take a photo and post it on your chosen social media outlet. The challenge has become “quite the thing” around the globe, for instance on instagram alone (as at 12.49pm on the 2nd June) there are 23,646,981 posts using the #100happydays hashtag.
A running group that I belong to set up a 100 days of happiness challenge event on Facebook three days ago and even though it irked my slight OCD tendencies that we were starting something on the 31st of May instead of waiting 24 hours to start “clean” on the 1st of June I was pretty excited to see out the entire 100 days especially since I’m a pretty happy person (unless I’m hungry/tired or caffeine deprived) nevertheless, since I only had to select one thing or moment in an entire day and I average loads of happy moments this was going to be easy!
And so far it has been – even yesterday when I drove all the way to Long Bay to get one last run in before my event on the weekend and the heavens opened up just before I arrived, I thought, no biggie, a “little rain” never hurt anyone (that is if you don’t include any of the people around in Noah’s time), alas as I got out of the car to grab my rain jacket I got pelted with hail! Hail!
Yeah – ummm I’m not that hardcore, I’ll flag the beach run thanks ..
So that seems pretty shite right? All that petrol, all that time .. wasted! How am I supposed to be happy now?
We’ll that one shite moment still didn’t overide “that moment” I’d had earlier in the day when as I quite literally crawled along the road during peak time traffic on a chilly winters morning, the sun streamed through the windscreen enveloping me in it’s warmth. I’ve found it’s the simple moments like that which always stand out for me. Which leads me to wonder – how do I capture that one moment in a photograph?
I guess I could have grabbed my phone and taken a photo of the sun, but since that’s against the law I’m not too keen on blatantly publishing the fact that I use my phone while driving, I’d have to find something else that made me happy, which would invariably be “things” (material much) or “things I do” (more handstands Julia?!?!).
So then my social media feed either turns into a long list of stuff I have, which you have to admit is pretty shallow or photo after photo of me smiling (because the sun made me warm or I’d just eaten and food makes me happy), standing on my hands (because handstands make me happy) or running in beautiful places (because I live in Godzone and that makes me happy) which is pretty much my entire instagram feed anyway, just without the hashtag.
And I can’t help but wonder if what I was happy about would in turn make someone else feel shite because, the sun didn’t shine for them, they can’t stand on their hands and they don’t live in Godzone ..
I concluded that I would do the #100happydays challenge BUT I wouldn’t take photos or broadcast it publicly (or in my online group) instead I’d make notes in my journal – just to remind me how awesome the ordinary is.
Till next time
