sjsprWriting

"The art of being happy lies in the power of extracting happiness from common things."

I think we, as a generation, often confuse sadness for lack of acute happiness. We stamp words like "depressed" or "suicidal" onto banalities of our everyday. A lack of a certain latte at Starbucks does not make you depressed, and the fact that you have to read a book for class is by no means a reason to say you want to kill yourself.

I think we've lost focus on not just what it means to be happy, but what it means to be sad. We glamorize moments of despair as romantic, and base beauty off of tragedy.

Sadness isn't brought out by the lack of beauty in our lives, and beauty is not exempt from happiness. Happiness allows beauty to seep through the otherwise commonplace aspects of our day to day.