The Many Roads to Happy

I used to think that the route to happy was like the twisted walk up a mountain to the peak. The trail - beaten, sometimes invisible. Only a few paths would make it to the peak, and each path a different length. Some steep paths shoot straight up to the top, with every step painful and every breath heavy, but with the shortest steps possible, the shortest time, the shortest distance. Other paths may zig-zag up the side of the mountain at a leisurely incline, and may double or triple the distance, but with less pressure on the system,and may get the hiker to the same peak with less energy. Then, I thought, some paths could wind endlessly in the woods with no progression to the peak, only to leave the hiker lost and unsuccessful in his or her quest.

This analogy, although flexible in theory with different paths, woods, rocks and cliffs, denies the seeker much choice. There are only choices in a few forks in a hiking path. For the most part, a hiker makes a choice in a path and follows the path to the end. Once the choice has been made to take the wooded route, the zig-zag route, or the steep route, the hiker is inevitably bound to the trail until the end.

I now see the road to happy with much more flexibility and choice. I see it now, more like the winding roads of Paris leading to the Eiffel Tower. There are probably a million combinations of roads which could be used to get there, depending on what a person wants to see on the way. There is the direct route, the meandering route, the lost route, and the "oh, never mind - I'd rather go shopping anyway" route. But, if a person walks long enough, and continues to make turns within the city limits, the odds are in the person's favor that, eventually, that person will pass the Eiffel tower. When I was in Paris, I preferred aimless wandering in the streets to fanatical site-seeing, so you might find me on the meandering route - stopping for croissants and coffee, a nap in the park, and maybe eavesdropping on some one's dinner party before finally reaching the destination of the Eiffel Tower, or reaching happy, because I enjoyed the trip along the way as much as the final destination!

I see happy as something you find maybe when you are not even looking for it, because one day you notice that you just feel good. This week I heard the birds for the first time this season, and after such a bitter, cold, icy, snowy winter - the song of the bird most definitely sang "happy".