Happiness is a feeling not a place ...

I'm a believer that happiness is a feeling not a place you arrive at or a level you achieve in the game of life. Sometimes your happy, sometimes your sad, angry, content ... but to be human is to be in a constant state of change.

The problem is that for the past year I have essentially been happy all the time. Being on maternity leave, at home with my daughter gave me so much happiness on such a consistent basis that when I returned to work last month I think I had lost sight of what happiness is and had started to believe that it should be a permanent state.

This past month, being back at work has been full of ups and downs and I think I was going through shock for awhile at the range of emotions I was experiencing on a daily and weekly basis. I think that the happy bubble I was living in during mat leave has officially burst now and I'm back in the "real world."

The last two weeks haven't been awesome and I've been feeling pretty melancholy but you know, I'm ok with that. I've remembered that life is like this and I just have to roll with it. It won't last forever ...

I picked up a book of poetry by Leonard Cohen the other day called The Book of Longing. Mr Cohen is amazing, and I have much envy of his brilliant prose. I find it funny though how some poetry just jumps out at you for unknown reasons. I'll leave you with my favourite poem so far:

Roshi at 89
Roshi's very tired,
          he's lying on his bed
He's been living with the living
          and dying with the dead
But now he wants another drink
          (will wonders never cease?)
He's making war on war
           and he's making war on peace
He's sitting in the throne-room
           on his great Original Face
and he's making war on Nothing
           that has Something in its place
His stomach's very happy
           The prunes are working well
There's no one going to heaven
           and there's no one left in Hell
                             -Leonard Cohen, Book of Longing