Recently I’ve heard everyone talking about happiness. About being happy. How to be happy. But what is happiness? Can you be bipolar and have happiness? What’s the secret to happiness? Once you have happiness, is permanent or is it fleeting?
Personally, I think happiness is over-rated.
Happiness isn’t truly the ultimate goal. There’s absolutely NOTHING WRONG with being happy. I love being happy. But happiness isn’t going to sustain me.
To me, what we should want is to be content. I’m not saying to be content is to SETTLE either. I’m just saying that being happy (in my opinion) is lesser than the peace you can feel in being content with your life. I’m saying, the secret to happiness is to actually be content instead. To learn to embrace and come to terms with bipolar disorder.
I’d say you cannot be depressed (or manic, necessarily) AND happy. I never am. But you CAN be those things and CONTENT.
I think it’s possible to find peace and contentment with bipolar disorder. I may not enjoy the rough times, I never said I did. In fact, I DON’T enjoy them at all. I definitely won’t be happy in pits of depression, but I CAN embrace my bipolarity. I can live with it, even learn to love myself in it, and I can certainly be content with it. Content to work on my bipolar disorder, content that “it is what it is.”
Check out my thoughts here on Embracing Bipolar Disorder in a guest post I wrote for the International Bipolar Foundation’s blog. (Super excited about it).
Content,
Mrs Bipolarity
