Only Happiness Will Do

Most days my life is better than I ever expected. For the other days, I try my best (sometimes fail, but 99% of the time happiness attitude wins) to put a positive spin on situations or challenges that arise. Keeping “Life is Short” at the tip of my tongue and at the front of my thoughts helps.

It has been a long road. My goal of changing the way I see things and react to things is just that—a goal. The work to continue in that direction has meant that I have given up relationships that I once thought important in my life. The decision to walk away from some friends and some family members was deliberate and it was life saving.

If you have ever been in a room with someone that holds so much anger and frustration and unhappiness that it hangs in the air, you know what I mean. It is suffocating. It is harmful. It is poison.

There are many studies that will show that stress will absolutely shorten your life. The effects of stress in early life are marked and eye opening. With that information, I choose to separate myself from those that use stress and anger to demand attention and control others. It’s just that simple.

Leaving people, especially family members, is not easy or taken lightly. It has been a very long process. There were letters, conversations, and warnings. There were negotiations: “If we can try to have civility when we interact socially, then we can at least have that”—but even trying to put limits on interactions and warnings that if they couldn’t behave and be nice that it would not be tolerated didn’t work and the bad behavior continued. I understand that someone may have had difficulties in their life that influence how they become those people you want to leave behind but ALL of us have had difficulties in our life and we try to do better. We try to grow up and move forward.

Friends that you leave may still run in some of the same social groups, but for the most part can be avoided. Family members that refuse to understand that you have reached your limits are still there with all the other extended family that will tolerate them. So, graduations, funerals, holidays are all still an exercise in decisions of whether or not to attend and be faced with the stress that they will invariably bring to any situation.

You might want to say to me “Be a grown up! We all deal with difficult people and family is family!” I understand that way of thinking. Really, I do. But try to see it this way: If you have worked all your life to change your outlook, be more positive, be more kind, be more happy and keep stress and drama out of home life and love, will you risk all your hard work by making yourself “deal with” those that wallow in a stressful and unhappy life? I try to think of it as a severe alcoholic or drug user that works to stay in “recovery” and must decide to avoid their old alcohol and drug-abusing circle in order to stay “clean”. Is that a drastic explanation or do you see the similarity?

Even social situations will bring out the ugliness with those that feed on stress and unhappiness and it will be aimed specifically at those that have left that life and don’t want to get caught up in drama and combat. Without fail, you have stirred the pot by simply refusing to be part of this type of sociopath-ology. You become a target by being in their line of sight because they no longer control all of their surroundings.

So, what to do? If other family members put up with it and seemingly come out unscathed, why can’t I? Why can’t I just ignore the biting remarks, the heaviness of the air in the room, the negativity and the hatred?

Because I am weak and don’t want to have to fight it off? Or because I’m strong and refuse to allow a bully to control a family function or a gathering of friends and therefore participate in it by simply being present. Because LIFE IS SHORT, I must be strong and refuse to be part of the negativity.

You can imagine that I’ve had friends and family question why I don’t continue to try to resolve the problems with those I have let go. Might I regret it when they are “gone”? Shouldn’t I be able to ignore it like they seem to do?

Maybe. 

But at this mature stage of my life, only happiness will do.