Collective Heartbreak - Is Happy Real?

photo by author

Clients occasionally arrive equipped for the journey – with appropriate gear for the long trek – aware that they are not going to get to the pinnacle or goal in a day. However, some sit on the couch with doe-eyes feeling as though they have been traveling on the rocky trail forever without an end in sight. They’ve run out of supplies. They may hope that I have a technique, a pill – something that will just make the pain go away.

In moments like those I wish I were a magician. A few weeks ago, I threw down my notebook and exclaimed: “Being a counselor sucks sometimes!” (I think my client and I were both a little surprised, but she knew I did it because I felt for her. I wanted more than anything to diminish her pain.) The only consolation I can offer clients is that things usually get better if they want it, stick with it and work at it. Change can be scary even when it is positive.

Some days a client might cover 10 miles on the trail and the next day it may start snowing and she may only travel a mile before setting up camp, but inevitably, she will arrive at her destination... or a destination. So we can’t always see the ground we’ve covered or how we’ve changed, but a year out or two we look back and feel like a different person.

People are occasionally suspicious of happiness, assuming that the happy person is faking it or just born
lucky. "Happiness" is a relative term and the idea of it may change over time. My idea of happiness it is not associated to something I have achieved or bought or given birth to (children or creative projects), although my children are beautiful people and I am lucky to be graced by their love and company. Happiness relates more to a perception, a way of being in the world. Echoing existentialist philosophers, meaning has more to do with who I AM and less to do with what I DO or have done.

In my early 20's I was a moody and depressed chick with low self-esteem. I entered counseling. That and my spiritual life helped me to heal and grow grateful. It’s not that I don’t experience hardship – people and animals still die; relationships still end, but I’ve learned to burn in the feelings and release them and not take things personally. I’ve learned not to over-analyze and to be present. I’m gentler on myself and others, and I laugh a lot. I DANCE, which has always been a path straight to JOY and BEING in this body. I feel free and people I love feel the freedom to be themselves.

When we begin to heal, the effect is retroactive. The memories stood out as painful fade to the background. I try to remember, but the anger is discharged, and, therefore, holds minimal sway. As I moved into being present, in one sense I was freed, and in another a new responsibility appeared. I was asked to remain open-hearted in the face of a harsh world. And, my heart breaks in a new way – on a daily basis – less horizontally and more vertically. Collective heartbreak. With presence comes heartbreak and with heartbreak comes gratitude for what I have and who is in my life how we love and celebrate one another.

It's not just happiness. People are equally suspicious of feelings, and some say to me: “When I go into my feelings, it gets me down.” It’s not the feelings that get us down. It’s the voice of the inner bully that wipes us out. If it’s not criticizing something we’ve done, it’s ripping on THAT we feel: “You big baby. Other people have bigger problems than you do.” By feeling our feelings we learn that we are vulnerable and human and that we are connected to every other living creature on this planet. We learn that we have the right to ask for what we need and we feel called to help in a bigger way. By feeling - free from thought and judgment - our feelings have the space to appear and move through us. We get to know ourselves. By asking the critic to quit following us on the path, we learn to listen to our deeper knowing, the knowing that will lead us to our unique mission on this amazing planet. What takes the place and space of the inner critic is creativity. (Inner critic: “If you get rid of me, you will have no one. NO ONE.” Little does it know!)

Some people punish themselves mercilessly. A relative dies and a client may feel that she could have done more or done it differently or better. Not only do their relationships end, but then they brutalize themselves with self doubt… and their inner critic jumps in like a bully: “Yeah you dumb piece of manure. Had you been smarter or better this wouldn’t have happened. You deserve it.” It’s like punishing a kid harshly when the natural consequence of what the kid did was punishment enough in itself. Insult to injury.

I give you full permission to un-invite, de-friend and banish the inner bully to the far recesses of your soul.

Regrets, recrimination, resentment and rage snowball until we are so stressed out we can’t see straight and forget how to laugh. We bind ourselves and expect our friends and partners to bind themselves up too. And, if they don’t, we turn the should-daggers on them. Why are we programmed this way? How is it we can’t see that remaining in the memory of pain only recreates the pain and strengthens the path to the brain, retriggering and making that our automatic way of thinking and operating? We recreate what we know. Where are we spending our energy and time? To what and whom are we willing to pay homage? I can see why so many people become fundamentalists of one kind or another. At least the obsessive nature of it wipes out the constant derision of the inner critic and replaces it with a positive… although some people just replace their inner bully with a deity. Equal exchange. Our expression of the spiritual is a direct reflection of the way our minds work. True spiritual is a grand mystery outside of words that we feel but can never know, but that’s a separate post that I will likely never write.

As a counselor I might not carry my clients’ food and water bottle in my pack (at least not all the way) but I will shine a light on the path in the dark. There may be people cheating or not taking full responsibility for their actions, but is it our obligation to point that out, to “police the world,” as Marianne Williamson once said. There will always be something or someone to criticize... or to celebrate. Where are you spending your energy?

You drew the map, and you are following your unique path to the pinnacle.

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change;

courage to change the things I can;

and wisdom to know the difference.

~Reinhold Niebuhr