I’m a steadfast behavior tracker and aim seeker, at all times aspiring to do/see/really feel/expertise extra. It’s the way in which I’m wired; I barely even take into consideration this facet of me, I simply dwell into it. However whereas I’m consistently on the hunt for extra, I acknowledge that I’ve received it fairly good. (I wouldn’t say I’ve it all, I feel it’s crass. It’s additionally unfaithful.) I get to remain house with my youngsters and take in each little second with them I can earlier than they develop up and go away the metaphorical nest. I’ve a accomplice who works laborious so I can keep house. We’re all in good well being, and I get to make use of my mind in ways in which gas me creatively, getting paid to do one thing I like. As somebody who has recognized her calling since she was younger, that is deeply satisfying.
It’s all satisfying, it’s all offering me with many moments of pleasure—and but I would like extra. Monetary freedom, journey, success—I would like all of it. Enter my cognitive dissonance. Why do I would like extra after I have already got a lot? Does that make me grasping and ungrateful?
After which there are those that have much less, for whom pleasure is one thing they have to actively pursue, solely to possibly, presumably, in the event that they’re fortunate, entry it. I really feel dangerous about it, like being so completely happy—happier than I’ve ever been (apart from possibly that 12 months I lived in Italy?)—is someway not good. Can I have a good time this pleasure when so many in my orbit wrestle to seek out it?
These questions run amuck in my head as I start to plan out my subsequent 12 months. They make me query whether or not I can have a good time my happiness after I know so many others are in a steady battle with their very own. I’m conscious it’s not my conflict to struggle, and me being much less completely happy isn’t going to supply others with extra happiness. Pleasure isn’t a pie; my piece doesn’t get smaller when yours will get greater. If something, I’d say it’s the other; pleasure multiplies. It’s the antidote to the common reality that harm individuals harm individuals.
Typically after I take into account all that I’ve received, then take into consideration what else I would like, I really feel a way of guilt, like the easy act of wanting extra makes me ungrateful for all that I’ve.
Even so, generally after I take into account all that I’ve received, then take into consideration what else I would like, I really feel a way of guilt, like the easy act of wanting extra makes me ungrateful for all that I’ve.
No extra of this! It isn’t incorrect to be completely happy. I’m not higher or worse than anybody else as a result of I’ve a life by which I expertise honest pleasure each day. Empathy is a real present to this world, however as I grapple with these ideas whereas contemplating my very own happiness and others’ lack of it, I understand how rapidly empathy can flip to martyrdom—and that advantages precisely none of us.
It’s additionally not incorrect to be formidable and to need to obtain extra. I have to clear up that nebulous dissonance as a result of I see now that if I don’t preserve working for extra—if I get caught within the mire of complacency—then my pleasure will slowly be siphoned away.
Possibly that need is my pleasure.
It’s not an absence of gratitude, it’s not wishing I had it higher; that drive is solely what brings me pleasure. And that could be a marvelous realization.
I’ve provide you with some mantras to assist me navigate this cognitive dissonance, and I’m going to share them with you in case you want a reminder concerning the lovely, transformative energy of one of many easiest phrases in our language: and.
I can love my life and need extra.
I can discover pleasure in my youngsters and need to spend time away from them.
I might be fulfilled and crave extra skilled satisfaction.
I might be content material and need to create extra.
I can love my individuals and need to be alone.
I might be mother and I might be me.
Mother and father, creators, people who exist in the present day—we’re pulled in so many instructions. We’re mother and we’re sister, worker and scholar. I should still be studying this, however I feel it’s okay to be content material—completely happy, even—in a single or all of our titles, and nonetheless need extra. And, importantly: it’s okay to really feel pleasure in our work, our life, {our relationships}, when not all people else does. What’s not okay is to dampen that pleasure as a result of others don’t expertise their very own.
I might be completely happy and others might be unhappy.
And whereas that’s a painful reality, it’s a reality nonetheless.
Kolina Cicero is enamored with tales – studying them, writing them, getting misplaced inside them. Different issues she loves embrace yoga, touring, and taking cooking, Italian, and writing courses. Her first youngsters’s e-book, Rosie and the Interest Farm, was revealed in July 2020.
