I saw this post on reddit the other day, asking what makes you feel successful. And it got me thinking about that, what DOES make me feel successful and along with that, what makes you HAPPY.
I haven’t been happy in a long time, truly happy. What exactly is happy anyway?
But successful let’s start there because I think that feeling successful brings about feeling happiness.
When I was younger I thought being successful was having a house, a good job, money, family… I’ve had all those except the family thing. and I’ve gotten rid of them. Did I feel successful while I had those things? I think so. I felt good owning a home, I hated my job but I felt good having a “high level” career, making good money.
Now, I have no idea. I don’t feel successful, in fact I hate even typing that word over and over in this post already. Everyone says “oh you’re living the life”; “you’re so lucky”. blah blah blah. Yeah, I supposedly AM living the dream life, but why the fuck do I feel like such a loser.
I feel like Charles is doing better in life than I am right now. I feel like Jay and James are doing better. Owen and Jhunrie. Randy and Zach. Calvin and Will. Etc etc. But, you see they are all couples… This is where success lies for me now and for a while. Just having a fucking partner will be success at this point. I’d give up this “amazing life” just to have a partner.
To sit at home and make dinner together, to plan trips together, to go sailing TOGETHER.
But is that really success? What _IS_ success? Is just waking up every morning success? What does Bill Gates see as a successful day. What does Barak Obama do every day to feel successful.
Was this trip to The Bahamas a Success or was it a failure. Did it make me feel anything different than I have the past few years? Did it make me move on, did it make me happier, did it make me realize anything special?
No.
In fact, I would say it did the opposite effect, it made me sadder, it made me feel less successful, it made me less joyful for sailing.
Was that the purpose though? TO make me realize that those small things are something I should enjoy. That making dinner for my partner is a bigger joyment to me then sailing the world? That just going to the gym or a nice dinner together is something to see as a success? But then that comes back to the fact that success is centered on having a partner.
And that in itself is a failed ideology, right? Everyone says you have to be “happy alone”. Bitch fuck off. I’ve been alone now for 6 months. I haven’t been on a date, had sex, or anything of the sort for 6 fucking months and I’m more miserable now then I was dating 5 guys a week. I’m fucking not happy alone. I want to go snorkeling today, I can’t (shouldn’t) do that alone. I want to move the boat to another spot to check it out, but I don’t have the energy or motivation to do that alone.
Doing EVERYTHING in life alone is fucking exhausting. Sailing the boat, cleaning the boat, cooking dinner, walking astra, cleaning dishes, grocery shopping, deciding where to go, watching the weather. It’s just fucking exhausting just thinking about it all.
And how the fuck is any of that “successful”.
I was at a coffee shop this morning waiting in line to order and tears started streaming down my face. Why? I have no fucking clue? It’s been happening more and more the past few days/weeks. I just randomly start crying. I miss my fucking boyfriend, I miss cuddling, I miss planning things together.
I don’t FEEL successful, I don’t feel happy.
And I can’t really tell anyone this because they will all say: “Chris, you’re crazy. You’re amazingly successful”.
Successful… being loved, being shown love, caring about other people? Is that a way to gauge success? Charles’ birthday was two weeks ago. Multiple of our “mutual” friends posted cute little pictures of him with “happy birthday”. NOT ONE person did that for my birthday… My family barely even acknowledged my birthday. So, I’m unsuccessful in that gauge?
Successful… Money, job. Sure? I guess, I have that
I dunno, what else does successful mean to me? HEre’s some of the interesting replies from the reddit thread…
To me, it’s essentially happiness. But how that’s been expressed over the years has changed. When I was younger, it was a long term monogamous relationship/marriage, a successful and lucrative career, home ownership, and travel (all achieved). Now it’s living an independent and fully self reliant life alone, creative notoriety and success, and achieving peace/harmony/serenity (also achieved).
Yeah… Ok first half I agree, I have also achieved all that but one… Second half, “achieving peace/harmony/serenity”. WTF does that even mean?
Success is the desire to get up in each morning. That sounds very simplistic, but if you have something positive to look forward to each day – meeting a friend, going on a date, watching a new episode of your favorite series, trying a new recipe, weather nice enough for a walk around the neighborhood -it means you’re making good use of your finite lifespan, no matter how small the victories.
Ok, very simplistic, but is that enough for me? Is just measuring success in such small amounts something that I can be happy with? I wake up every morning, I do stuff. I walk the dog every day, I make myself food. But it doesn’t feel grand enough to be fullfilling in the end of life. When I look back on my life, will I be like “oh yeah, that one day astra and I walked through the park was amazing”. No. But I will look back and say “that year we went sailing was a crazy experience”
This leads to something else though, is it success if it’s just your story, walking alone. For me, no. Which leads us back to a partner.
Content. Not happiness, happiness like sadness is fleeting.
A job that I don’t cringe going to daily, a great group of people in my life, good food, fun party nights, travel, working out, coffee, sex, nature, cute dogs, and constantly reminding yourself of these great things through gratitude.For me it’s a combination of things. I value my relationship with my partner above all and we have built a good life. We live a comfortable middle class lifestyle, we enjoy traveling, have a great group of friends and family, Right now I would say life is good.
This… This right here is what I want…. This is successful for me.
Now, how do I accomplish that…. how do I move on from Charles. Cause it’s been a year and a half and I still feel like I’m not going to be able to love the same way again. I know I said that after Calvin too…. And it’s true. It took me 5 years after Calvin, is it going to take another 5 years after Charles. Everyone says that “I’m” the one who “got away” from Charles, that he should regret our breaking up. But why do I regret it so much. Why do I miss him every day still. I wake up hoping to see his name on my phone. a message saying “hey”. To have him reach out and just talk again. I can’t move on from him and it’s fucking stupid. I feel like a fool because of that. He’s moved on, Clavin had moved on. But here I am still stuck. still dreaming still wishing. For him to come back.
It’s never going to happen.
And so here we are, unsuccessful, unhappy, failure.
But from the outside, successful, happy, SUCCESS.