The Wise Ry Guy

Happiness is not a thing to be found

Rather, it is achieved unconsciously amidst the pursuit of other things

Particular things

If you are looking to be happy,

you are not

obviously

For happiness to take form for my soul, in the likeness with which I conceive it, as a realistic prospect for me, is moot.

I don’t know what it is.

That’s what I’m saying, if that was unclear

I’m not saying I’m not happy

I wrote this recently when I was disheartened

now I am editing it with a content spirit

I am conscious of some semblance of happiness right now

and as I am dwelling on it now I feel it slipping away under inspection haha

moving on

That was a good sentence though so my meter is back up a little more

yeesh

Typically I just experience bursts of spiritual satisfaction (dopamine?)

which propel me forward

Not far, but enough, I suppose

You might think

Ryan, are there not things which make you happy

Well!

the fact that I just put

That question in

Your mouth in

My article written by

Me only

should give you a clue as to my method of undermining any chance I may have at unconscious happiness

which we can simply call happiness

[Song suggestion: “another dream just came true” by The Oak Ridge Boys

Why?

because I was just listening to it 20 seconds ago]

Because!

again,

as soon as happiness is self-aware…

It becomes a sadder version of itself

in my experience, at the very least

nice thought, right

And that is all that I know

My experience, that is

so

Shall we do a head-count?

Of all the things I experience or have experienced which foster some sort of joy

Yeah sure let’s do it I can’t think of any possible ways this could be a bad idea

:

God makes me sad because I can’t know if he’s real

Music makes me sad because it makes me feel

Work makes me sad because it is a compressed (microcosmic?), and therefore the most apparent, manifestation of the vanity of all things

Due to its immediately cyclical nature, that is

yeah

Labor isn’t the alienator

Reality is

Life alienates.

stickin’ it to mr. Karl ha

The things I make make me sad because they make me happy, and if i’m the best I can do then the universe must truly hold nothing for me

People make me happy

But missing them doesn’t

Books

satisfy my soul

But in the same page they break me and rob my resolve

which is something you’d be hard pressed to find in my chest regardless

Books

Are so interesting and bigger than themselves and more complex than any one mind can envelop through understanding

And they teach me so much

They fill me with hope and awe

but

They also remind me of the person I could be

The person I hope to be

and the number of times I’ve given up trying to be that person

And then, upon the reminder,

I give up again

from the complacent comfort of the wallowing I do in my bed, no less!

No wonder I like my naps

Forrest runs

I go to sleep.

Ishmael takes to sea

and I don’t.

I pine from the shoreline, but I’m not sure that I can even see the water through my sun glasses

They’re polarized, so

because squinting is such an uncomfortable strain for me

You know,

the tint of self

Primarily aggrandizing, demoralizing, and hatred

Between church and prayer, music, work, my creativity, people, and books,

Happiness appears a bit scarce

well

No wonder happy people aren’t perpetually conscious of their happiness

because it’s the wrong question to ask

Every statement, belief, mindset, etc. operates on an implicit question

You could call it motive

but I’m not sure how precise that’d be

For example,

when I made my list of sad stuff

I neglected all of the good parts of each of those things

All of those things have made me happy consistently and will continue to do so

Even church despite how annoying mundane and ignorant it can be

Forgive my omission of

Punctuation, is it really necessary?

When I wrote that list, I was operating on the wrong question

Mainly because I was more discouraged than I had been in awhile

which is impressive

Here, some more attention-seeking self-deprecating probably-untrue humor for you

If you hadn’t had enough

I was operating on the wrong question because I was focused on my sadness

Though thats a strong word for what I was feeling and “wearied discouragement” does a better job of articulating it

I was tired, basically

The appropriate question, premise, acknowledgement, motive, whatever

was this: All things have a dual nature, at every echelon of categorical analysis.

I was reducing each thing to its negative extreme

Thus, the right question was not the sadness of all things

but the duality of them

And

If we zoom out to possibly as broad a category as is comprehensible to man (though maybe not – haven’t thought about it)

Our question is reality itself

yep

which is pretty much always the question at some fundamental level

So

If you are ever feeling particularly emotional and/or broken

and you no doubt have some problems to consider,

start with reality.

That’d be good.

Articulate everything that is undoubtedly real.

Then, find the next question

And do it slowly

And maybe avoid the why questions at first and go with how and what then

I don’t know, maybe not

shooting in the dark here.

I do have a point, by the way

And it is not even by the way

It is my main point!

kudos for making it this far

So

I have a little patch on my shelf

It’s one of my favorite things in the world

It is a circle, with a radius of about 1.5 inches

It has a golden trim, and it depicts a bunny in a green meadow overlooked by a blue sky

The patch is inscribed with the words

existence is suffering

It is easily one of the funniest, most beautiful, and truest things I’ve ever seen

I am able to spend no small amount of time discussing the many reasons why I love this patch so much

But I’ll just leave it with this:

The look on the bunny’s face

is priceless

And it is exactly how I feel

But I do not claim to be characterized in the same way that I will now characterize this bunny, according to how I’ve observed it

Which is that

this bunny appears to have obtained an intimate familiarity both with the shallow, external details of physical being as well as the fundamental truths of the whole of existence

And it wears what strikes me as a humble, even innocently dubious, smirk

The look on this fascinating bunny’s face communicates a deep, dissatisfied and yet oddly accepting understanding of the world which can be summed up fairly adequately by the words,

“well, I’m here aren’t I?”