Make Someone Happy?

I was talking to a good friend the other day, a wonderful person, a nice guy, and he said, in reference to another person we both know, “If only I could make her happy.”

A nice thought. Very like him. But I said, “You can’t.”

You can add to someone’s happiness and embellish it, but you can’t create it for them. You can open the door to happiness, but it’s up to the other person to walk through that door.

And the same is true in reverse. No one can make you happy. That’s on you. But they can help you enjoy the happy more by sharing it with you, or they can offer you a ticket to Happy-ville, but you have to want that ticket and see the value and invest in the opportunity yourself. Happiness is a choice, after all. Not always easy, but a choice nonetheless. 

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately because I see a lot of blank people walking around – not sad, certainly not happy, just blank, like paint by number pictures waiting to be filled in. Well, maybe it’s time to pick up a brush and start painting (not literally, necessarily...but that’s not a bad idea either.) Fill in your blanks, accomplish something, color your world, find the happy!

And when you do, open the door and welcome other people to join you. If they do, great! If not, well, that’s on them. But if they did, wouldn’t that be nice?

Oh, and if you think all this sounds way too schmaltzy and surface and shallow, I don’t really care. Ya know why? Because I’m happy. And that’s my choice. And I’ve always been pro choice. 

“Happiness depends upon ourselves.” 

- Aristotle