I have never completely understood our obsession with being happy.
Happiness has become almost a performance. People talk about finding happiness, protecting their happiness, choosing happiness, creating happiness. As if happiness were a permanent state we could achieve if we just bought the correct book, found the correct person, moved to the correct city and drank the correct green juice.
Life doesn't work like that.
You can be happy on Tuesday and miserable on Wednesday. You can have everything you thought you wanted and still feel empty. You can have a terrible day and still feel that your life has meaning.
Maybe meaning is more important than happiness.
Happiness is a feeling. Meaning is a direction. Feelings change constantly. Directions can remain.
There are things worth doing even when they are difficult. There are people worth loving even when relationships are complicated. There are goals worth pursuing even when you occasionally want to throw everything into the ocean.
Perhaps a good life isn't one where you feel good all the time. Perhaps it is one where the bad days still belong to something you consider worthwhile.
I don't want a life without suffering. That sounds impossible anyway.
I want a life where the suffering means something.