When I was a kid I subscribed to the view that life’s ups and downs average themselves out naturally. That if a person has suffered a sustained period of boredom or depression then they are due some happiness or natural euphoria. My own experience seemed to fit with this. I’d have long periods of despair and feeling that life is barely worth living, then something would trigger a change in the way I evaluate or percieve things and I’d feel a deep sense of happiness or euphoria, even if for just a short while. The significance of the shift would outweigh the shortness of it.
Now that I’m a bit older, taller, and a good deal heavier I’m not so sure. I haven’t had a perception-shift for years. I’ve been stuck in a rut of psuedo contentment with the rare and inadequate interruption of superficial cheeriness.
Am I due a really big shift that will make me pull my socks up and build a full life for myself? Or am I just discovering that childhood is (or was) the best period of life?
Every time I think about my overall situation I think it sucks. It has been that way for as long as I can remember. I guess if even the slightest thing goes good I do feel pretty intense happiness, if only for a short time. I think it’s just my brain hoping for something good to happen so desperately that any sweet moment that comes across gets held onto real tight until reality inevitably sets in.
I would not know if the opposite would hold true. That if someone is happy all there life and something insignificant goes wrong, would they fall into a short period of despair?
I think the human condition/emotional mindest, not unlike water, finds it’s own level. When things are “good”, that’s the norm and everything outside that norm is either good or bad. When things are “not so good” for an extended period of time, then that is set as the norm and everything outside that becomes either good or bad in relative terms.
