Oblivious happiness

I once saw this picture that horrified me and made me giggle like a school girl at the same time. It was this picture of a kid’s baseball team posing for a team picture. Everyone was standing on the bleachers after what appears to be a BIG win and the kids were all facing the camera in three layers….smiling broadly….except for the one kid in the back row. It’s at the exact moment the picture was taken that this poor child in the back row projectile vomited on the first two rows of obvious happy children. The picture is snapped literally seconds before this unexpected barrage of puke douses the first two rows of children. Oblivious happiness.

Now I can only imagine what followed in those few seconds after. I imagine lots of screaming and possibly some sympathy puking by others, but for those first few seconds, no one cared. All they knew was to stand still, smile and be happy for just two seconds. It’s amazing how life changes in a blink of an eye. How many of us live life in a stupor of what we’ve convinced ourselves is happiness. How many of us have convinced ourselves that our job, our partner, our boss, our lifestyle is making us happy? It’s when one tiny thing shifts that we begin to refocus our eyes and see things - well to see them differently. To see them as they really are.

My parents were married for 20 some years. To most people who knew them, they appeared happy - well as happy as anyone with 7 kids to raise could be. They both had jobs, they appeared to have friends both socially and professionally and occasionally, we as a family appeared to be happy going on family vacations or trips to visit relatives. To most people we appeared status quo - that is until one day we weren't. At some point within that life, my father decided he no longer wanted to live this life.
Somewhere along the way he decided he was no longer going to get up, go to work, come home and do it all over again. He went on a fishing trip with friends and something compelled him to quit his life just like that. Apparently you can throw the baby out with the bath water. With no warning or explanation he simply  called my mother and told her “I never loved you, I’m not coming home.” And just like that, the life we had all known, the oblivious happiness we convinced ourselves was happening was done.

Like a band-aide being torn off, the gross underbelly of our lives were exposed for all to see. We were a broken family. It would take years and a few episodes of my father coming back deciding to “try one more time to make things work” before my parents finally and totally called it quits. It was confusing to us because we had never really seen that side of my parents. We had never really known the issues between them, the years of unhappiness, the times they had to bite their tongues and stay together "for the sake of the kids." It never occurred to us - until it did - that they were not happy. They were not in love and certainly did not want to spend another minute pretending otherwise.

To them, it was an obvious choice...and looking back, it probably was. It’s always in the looking back we are able to see things more clearly. We all became used to the way things were, oblivious to what we thought WAS happiness. How many of those situations do we each have now? Looking back over the last year – are there things you need to change? I'm fairly certain I could make a list.

Just like most people do….we live a life we think we are supposed to until one day we don’t. What makes it happen? Is it one person? Is it a conversation? Is it the feeling that you are constantly living a day in the life of that movie Ground Hog’s Day – where the person keeps reliving a situation over and over and over until they actually learn the lesson? How many moments are we living every day that we are oblivious to? How many times at work do you have to say to yourself “today is going to be a better day”? or in a relationship “I won’ t let them treat me like this anymore! I am going to stand up for what I want!” only to be waking up and experiencing that same day over and over and over to the point you thing that’s what normal is. We convince ourselves that not only are we happy but this is how it's supposed to be.

I say enough with living obliviously. It’s time we become conscious and intentional in our own world. In personal and professional ways it’s time we take the blinders off and face things head on. If they aren’t right, change them. We have the power to do that. We have the ability each and every moment to decide what our NORMAL should be. What is it going to take to for you? What do you need to clear the clutter out of your head to be able to see clearer? If you’re always fighting something, it’s pretty obvious there is a reason…your subconscious knows more that you are letting on.

Go for bold, go for real – life it too short to live life half-way. How about living HAPPILY here and now – now that’s a concept isn’t it.