Money…money…money…
Sound like a familiar theme song? Of course it does. We’ve all chased the dollar at some point in our lives. You might even be chasing it right now. Now…relax. I’m not going to tell you that you’re a terrible, awful person if you’re chasing the dollars. I’ve got something else in mind to tell you.
It involves where you put your happiness. And where you SHOULD put your happiness.
We’ve all heard the sayings about money…It’s the root of all evil…It can’t buy happiness or love…It’s the Devil’s tool. Whatever. I want to challenge all that. So, let’s start out with a bit of humor…
"While money can't buy happiness, it certainly lets you choose your own form of misery." - Groucho Marx
We all seem to subscribe to the belief that somewhere there exists something that when we get it we will find, at long last, true happiness. For some people that might be a magic amount of dollars, for some it’s the hottie down the street, for others it’s a yacht or a car or SOMETHING.
You see, we’ve become grooved to think that SOMETHING is going to MAKE us happy. We’ve given up our personal right and ability to happiness and we’ve placed the burden of our happiness on something or someone else.
Yes…I said the BURDEN of our happiness. Why did I put it that way? Because if you are not responsible for your own happiness, then it IS a burden for someone else to carry. Want to know something else that I will state as a FACT?
When you burden someone or something with the responsibility of your happiness…it will fail and you won’t ever get the happiness that you deserve.
No amount of money will make you happy. It’ll make some things in life easy, but it won’t make your life happy. No boat, or car, or beautiful girl or guy, will EVER be able to make you happy.
Why not? I hear you asking…me too at one time. :-)
Simply because it is only so much STUFF. And stuff never lasts. The money gets spent, the things loss their shine, and people can only try for so long. There is only one thing that will ever be able to make you happy in life. That’s YOU. You have the choice of happiness. Sadly, most people don’t make the choice to be happy. I think that most people don’t even realize that it IS a choice. Most people might not even know what real happiness even is.
We spend a significant portion of our lives searching, on the outside, for happiness. And as a result, just like Groucho says, we spend our lives in a form of misery. Always reaching for the next THING to make us happy. Tasting only brief moments that we try to hold on to, instead of living each and every day with that feeling.
Wanna know a secret? You CAN have that lifelong happiness. Even right now, wherever you happen to be on the path. You see, happiness comes down to a choice. You can choose to look around you, at your life and the world and everything in it, and see everything as bad or depressing or difficult…OR…you can look around you and see the wonderful things that come into your life every day. You can see the hard times for what they really are…a chance to become more.
You lose a job…you can be depressed and scared and worried…OR…you can decide that it’s time to move on, you’ve learned what you needed from this job and now can find another.
You lose a relationship…you can be depressed and sad and bitter and hurt…OR…you can see what went wrong and become more than you were in that relationship.
Are you starting to get the idea? Everything in life can be taken as good or bad. That’s the idea with THINGS! Money isn’t evil. Obsessing about money and pursuing it to the exclusion of everything else in life…IS. The boat or car or other things won’t bring happiness. It doesn’t mean you can’t have them or want them…as long as they fit into their proper place in your life and don’t become what your life is about. And the hottie down the street? Will probably stop and talk to you…when your life is FULL of all the happiness YOU can cram into it.
There’s always a choice. Let’s start a movement together and call it…”Choose Happiness!”
And the house with all the people and loud music…that’s my place. Come on in. We’re all happy here! ;-)
1 comment:
I'm going to go against the grain on this one. Being someone for whom money had always only been a means to an end - I've never understood people who chase it vehemently.
Now some of the things you've challenged are tidbits of wisdom (although slightly misquoted) from scripture - and they are pretty much there for a reason. We won't get into that though as I don't feel like Sermonizing today.
I'll just challenge the idea that you and you alone are responsible for your own happiness. Why? Because ti isn't entirely true. Our happiness is a two (or if we serve the Lord a three) way street. Yes we are responsible in part for our own happiness.
However, other people get a hand in it too, and the moment you start looking at it as "the burden of someone else's happiness" you are on the wrong track.
Are we our brother's keeper? You'd better believe we are -
So lets look at some examples that are more drastic than "I lost my job", or "I lost the person I used to squeeze"
These are both things which can be readily replaced. The items aren't irrevocable gone from this exisitance - they are still there
How about, "Crazed teenagers with firearms went into the school and gunned people down. MY Children were among them"
or
"MY wife was driving my children to the zoo. A Drunk driver jumped the median and struck the car in the windshield killing them all."
or
"My husband of 20 years was just killed in a foreign country leaving me to care for our children and our home by myself. I never went to college and have no marketable skills so I can't get a job. Tomorrow we loose our home and I can't even feed my kids."
There are a lot more real tragedies I can come up with, but come on?
Let's be realistic. Let's dig deep for a moment and do something really profound. Let's throw out the clap trap, new age, politically correct idea that you and you alone are responsible for your happiness. It's hogwash. Like many of the things that we discuss in life, it only scratches the surface.
In every situation listed above - from I lost my girl to my family was killed horribly, there had better be people around you who realize that your happiness, your grief, and even your inability to function are all theirs.
We need to be there for those people and we need to be the frame work on which they can begin to rebuild for themselves. We can hopefully point them toward the Lord as well - but in the case we can't, then it is our privilege to be on our knees interceding on their behalf.
I do count it a privilege to serve those I love, even if it is on my knees when they are too far away for me to be a physical comfort. I see in scripture that I am in part responsible.
Does that relieve people of their responsibility to themselves? No way. But neither does the idea that they are responsible for themselves relieve me of the fact that I too am responsible - called even - to stand firm and lift them up.
We talked about Loyalty, and this is where loyalty really shines. We talked about Heroes, and this too is where heroes really show their metal.
"Never the less I stand by you, (hypotheical) sword in hand to help ward off the things that afflict you. When you are too weak I stand over you and shield you. I will help you to realize that you can stand, and that you do have the strength. And when I can't do that I pull you up so that you know that you are not alone - even in the worst of times."
We are responsible for one another bro - in happiness, in sadness, and everything in between. The sooner we realize that we are responsible for ourselves, but also dependent and depended on by the people around us, the sooner we can stop dragging our feet and acting like giving the same that our master gave is a chore.
Never the less I stand . . .
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