Controlling Your Happiness

It is now Friday of what I have been referring to as "The Worst Week Ever" here recently.  You know those times in life where a string of unfortunate events keep piling up?  It started with Eli getting some of the worst diaper rash he has ever had on Sunday night.  Then on Monday, I lost my keys at work and ended up stranded there for an additional 2.5 hours until Mark could make it back down to pick me up.  I have racked my brain and torn apart my office for 2 days and the keys have yet to show up.  My latest theory is that while on the phone with my grandmother during lunch, I accidentally threw them away.  Even better, we didn't have a spare set.  So after 2 consecutive days of leaving my van in the parking deck at work, we can now say that we own 2 brand new keys to our van.  xXsighXx

To make matters worse, our house in Warner Robins' (which has been under contract for almost a month) appraisal came back under the negotiated sale price.  UGH!  Thankfully, it wasn't much under the contract amount so we were able to renegotiate and continue with the closing process.  It was just one more shattered piece of my week.  Then there were the small things such as my computer crashing at work, not being able to workout since I was doing after work activities such as getting the van re-keyed, going to an early morning meeting at the other campus for work just to find out that it was actually scheduled for Monday (not Thursday) and then letting the stresses of all of these situations effect my relationship with Mark in small explosions.  I know, I know the last item mentioned is so completely out of character of me since I am so well composed and even-tempered (wink wink).

I was culling over the events of the week while sitting in a training course for work, determined that I had to have done something to deserve the crap I faced.  It was there that the instructor of the class (a 76 year old man whose eldest daughter had died of cancer, one of his 19 grandchildren never made it past infancy due to SIDS, and his investments had been lost during 9/11 because his investment company was located in one the twin towers and had no backups) got off on a tangent from the course material and stated,

 "An individual is only as happy as he lets himself be." 

This man who had endured much tragedy in his life still felt in control of his own happiness.   It was in that one sentence that I realized I was contributing to my own demise. 

Since the realization that I was the main contributing factor for my "worst week ever", I started thinking about how many of us get so wrapped up in the minor little details of life that we forget how precious life is and how blessed we really are.  Have you ever had a "friend" on facebook continually update his/her status to tell you and the rest of the world about the latest crappy thing that has happened to them?  I mean a status here and there out of frustrantion is ok (hence my earlier status update on facebook:

"Somehow managed to lose my keys while at work leaving me stranded here....it is bad enough I have been ready to go home all day and now I get to be here another 2 hours!")

but the daily negative references are so miserable to read!  I have deleted a couple of "friends" due to this condition.  Reading their negative statuses made me feel negative as well.  Those are the type of people my instructor was talking about...the ones that will never allow themselves to be happy.  If they aren't worrying about one thing, they are worrying about another.  They blame others around them for making their lives so miserable but what it really boils down to is that they control how everything effects them.  I was becoming one of those people!  Taking a step back from my "worst week ever", I realize that while it may have been a series of unfortunate events; it wasn't my worst week ever. 

It is about to be the weekend and after all I have been through I still have my little family in my corner including a little boy that forgets as quickly as they come about, any of the negative things that happen to him (like not being able to ride the dog or color on the walls).  My life is not perfect and I wish more than anything that my mom was still here, but I am still blessed.