Deserve

Deserve. The word has haunted me as of late, and it isn't the first time.  Though this time it's different. This time I have a whole different perspective ready to go.  My thoughts on this word are formed and what ever anyone says, I won't believe them.  I'll say...I refuse, refuse to think I deserve better, more, happy.  Happy? We deserve to be happy? When was that ever a thing.  Oh, that's right, it is in every. movie. ever. and book. and almost everything everyone says to you.  Our little worlds revolve around this thing called "happiness" but I hardly know what it is.  I wonder if you do. Look, I do get it. Being happy feels nice. Being happy isn't something to directly not look for or seek, but I think if you have really lived any years of your life and experienced even the smallest amount of pain, you have realized that life is not all about being happy. So why do we have this ridiculous obsession with happiness? (Moulin Rouge reference *cough cough*)

Well, I sound like I need some Prozac. Why do I have such bad, nasty feelings towards the word deserve?  For years I thought this was something we were supposed to look for in another person. You deserve a person to do "such and such" thing for you. Bruno Mars puts it nicely to tune "I hope he buys you flowers, I hope he holds your hand..." Right. Duh, Bruno.  It's not rocket science. It's not even that catchy when you say it.  Hunter Hayes has a good rendition too of what a relationship should consist of. I can't bear to repeat the words here, mostly because I might gag on the food I am eating. You get it, you know what I am talking about.

Years ago someone once told me after I whined and whined about a past relationship that I just needed to pull myself up by my bootstraps and accept what I had done to make that relationship a bad one too. Psh, I didn't believe them. I hadn't done a. thing. wrong.  Which wasn't true, I was really mean. I threw things, I was crazy jealous all the time.  And even though I hadn't been treated well and that was true, and even though it didn't work out and I am glad and that's also true, it didn't have a thing to do with happiness.

Have you ever stuck out any relationship, friendship, family tie past the point of happy? I guarantee you have.You have to if you want to have any friends left. It doesn't feel very good most of the time.  Now there are all sorts of reasons why you may and should try this: marriage, living in community, loving people past their brokenness, loving people more than yourself, realizing that you aren't perfect, either.  Ugh this list is depressing  isn't it? All I want to do is take care of myself and protect myself, right? That's what life is all about, right?

Oh... wait...

When I say none of us deserve to be happy, I do not mean we shouldn't desire respect, care, understanding, kindness, patience, and love in all relationships, in all things.  Those are all good, healthy things.  I'm just sayin', get this happy mumbo jumbo out of your head, because I don't believe you'll ever find it. Not the way you expect. And I am saying it myself. Again, and again. And again.

Or, at least, if you are stubborn enough to still be an optimist let me say this: happy*

* will always include hard.

Pursue happiness, if you must, but don't think it'll be easy.  Don't fool yourself into thinking that being happy even feels good.  Choose happiness. Choose love.  Choose the hard thing. Choose to say, "I deserve nothing" and then work as hard as you can to give what you think others deserve.  Here's the clincher: expect nothing in return. Easier said than done, all of this. I would rather try, though, try to live life like this instead of searching for happiness that will never complete, never make one whole.

Peace. Peace is the feeling, the knowing, the being that is better than any happiness you'll ever know, I think. It sinks down in and you can't shake it. It won't go away, it only settles, only shapes you. Seek and pursue peace, and what you think you deserve may change after all.