The views along your Journey

On the days when small things don't make you happy

It feels like time has been flying by quickly from last few weeks for me. If you ask me, what did I do the Monday that just passed, I have to make an effort to remember it. People will say, it’s a symptom of aging. Nah I don’t agree with this. I think I am young enough to remember what I did last Monday. If you ask me anything hard happened in the last few weeks, I will say, yes, few things were hard, but I was over and done by them. To be honest, there were few good things happened too, the joy of those things stayed just for few hours or a night.

Photo by Elza Kurbanova on Unsplash

It feels like I am missing on the taste of life. My favorite ice cream is not tasting as delicious as it was before. Work has been busy, but busy in an exhausting way, it could be busy in fulfilling way too. The words I am reading on Substack or from the current book I am reading are not staying with me. Hence, I have been both reading and writing less. Nothing I have been watching on TV, pleases me enough to complete it. I start something and then after 10 minutes, I am just scrolling through my phone. The only thing which I can bear are the old Bollywood movies. May be, because I know the story, the beginning, the songs, even the dialogues and the endings which are usually the happy ones. They are not seeking much of my attention so I could complete them.

All of this is happening while I tick off almost all the tasks in my to-do list, in a bare minimum way. Hence there is no sense of fulfillment even in completing tasks, only exhaustion. Exhaustion which is not going away with any amount of physical rest. I always believed that I am a person who finds happiness in small things but that’s not what is happening now. Even the happiness from big things is not staying for longer.

Have I felt like this before? Yes, I have. I have lived years of my life with those feelings. Hating them, hating myself for having those feelings. Now I don’t hate myself for anything I feel. I know I am more than what I am feeling in the moment. Now my approach is to acknowledge and be curious about all my feelings.

There are few things which I desire to have in life. I have been lying to myself and acting like I don’t care if I don’t get it. But the reality is I actually care. The reality is the thoughts of not able to achieve those things have been making me feel anxious and overwhelmed from last few weeks. I have been attached to achieve certain outcomes. Deep down I can also say I have been attaching my worth to those things. I will be a lesser woman if I don’t achieve those things. I have been comparing myself from the people who have it. My ego has been telling me you are so much better than those people, what a shame that you still don’t have it. My inner critic telling me nah you are not good enough to achieve those things, maybe you need to heal more, learn new skills or ask more people for feedback.

I am so focused on the outcome for few things that anything else is not making sense to me. Subconsciously I am acting like that child, get me that purple toy, I don’t want chocolates, balloons, donuts, cake or ice cream. Although I love ice cream and custard donut in general when I am not obsessed with the feeling of getting that purple toy.

Often in life, we get so worried and overwhelm about getting that one thing, that other good things which we have doesn’t bring any joy. That one thing might come, if our actions are aligned and consistence. The timing might be different than what we are expecting. But we can’t afford to lose our sanity or joy on the way to achieve that. If the journey mostly is not bringing us joy and peace, the feelings after reaching to the destination will not be any different. You need to feel almost alright even without that thing in your life. I know some days might feel hard than others without that thing, but overall we are alright. I hope you all doing well and thanks for being here.

Lots of love and healing,

Harneek!

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This week’s recommendations:

• Is Anything Actually Good, Actually? by

  Lidija Nagulov - ArtDHD Substack
  . I really enjoyed the writing, story and message on this one. The message is about dismissing the black and white thinking

• Can introverts become extroverts? by

  Shanjitha
  . This one has some amazing tips for my fellow introverts to navigate life and it’s challenges

• Is life nothing but a dream? by

  Spiritual Entertainer
  . This is a very thoughtful and fascinating one on our collective consciousness