sometime in january, a friend of mine told me i should pick up a man without a country by kurt vonnegut. i immediately did; literally, i came home from class that afternoon and read the entire thing in one sitting. i was pissed. i was pissed because the book wasn't longer, because it only took me one afternoon and not a lifetime to read. it is a book full of the most beautiful sentiments, and i would strongly recommend it to anyone who enjoys reading.
but that's not what i want to talk about today. i want to talk about this exact quote. but to start off, i want to show you a picture of me and some of my former friends in high school (i'm in the middle, lookin' a little frizzy because it was like, at least 1000 degrees and humid out that evening).
i can honestly tell you that this picture was taken during one of the least happy times of my life, and there are probably around 30 pictures of me from this night, and you know what? you can't tell in a single one of them. this was a phase in my life when i was miserable all the time (as was most of high school, but i'll talk about this some other time), and i still managed to look happy.
thing is, this quote is totally the right idea. it's okay to feel like shit, and it's okay to have dark times. no one wants to stay in dark times though. dark times aren't fun in any way at all. but just because you're having a dark time doesn't mean you don't have happy moments, just like how when your general feeling is happy, you can have sad moments.
it's all about acknowledging the happy moments. that night was a happy moment. and i acknowledged it was a happy moment, said to myself "if this isn't nice, i don't know what is", and maybe later i went back to feeling miserable, but for that moment, i didn't let my misery stop me from feeling happiness.
in another dark time in my life, i used to keep a journal of happy things about my day, just to keep myself accountable and reassure myself that it wasn't all bad. and it's not. you just have to let yourself feel it when it's nice.
but really, go read a man without a country, it's a stellar read.
it's all about acknowledging the happy moments. that night was a happy moment. and i acknowledged it was a happy moment, said to myself "if this isn't nice, i don't know what is", and maybe later i went back to feeling miserable, but for that moment, i didn't let my misery stop me from feeling happiness.
in another dark time in my life, i used to keep a journal of happy things about my day, just to keep myself accountable and reassure myself that it wasn't all bad. and it's not. you just have to let yourself feel it when it's nice.
but really, go read a man without a country, it's a stellar read.
um okay bye,
kristina
kristina
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