I originally intended this post to be about embracing the hopeless nature of happiness. I wanted to contemplate utopia - a reality in which you could attain anything and everything you wanted; a world in which you could live forever and never suffer; a place with no pain, no loss, no grief, no constraints on your time, and no limits to your resources. I was going to paint a panorama of perfection in which you would ultimately discover that this Promised Land would actually be pretty boring. Bertrand Russell said, “The human animal is adapted to a certain amount of struggle for life. The mere absence of effort from life removes an essential ingredient of happiness.” Other philosophers, writers, and scientists, have echoed this thought in various ways, and the idle rich (or the spoiled, narcissistic teenager) have reinforced the theory that indulgence and pleasure are often mindless and meaningless; and generally have very little to do with Happiness.

After convincing you of the necessity of struggle, and showing you how it would be impossible to have carefree happiness, I was going to make the additional point that in this reality you have no choice but to give unhappiness (pain and adversity) equal time, and since this is the case, why not embrace it? Why not wring every droplet of Truth that you possibly can, from its scrawny, little neck? Why not look it in the eye, (or any orifice of your choosing), and learn from it? I was going to tell you how Sun Tzu encourages you to ‘know your enemy’ and I was (finally, yet with a flourish) going to argue that to attain happiness you must first gain wisdom through unhappiness.

But if I had written this post, would it have really made you feel better?

I didn’t think so – that’s why I’ve changed my mind …

Instead of telling you stuff that you already know, I simply want to say …

… Don’t be afraid to talk about it.

It’s okay to acknowledge the dark; without it, there would be no light.