You Can’t Always Get What You Want

     I’m showing my age, quoting a song lyric from The Rolling Stones.  It makes me think of the topic happiness, to be featured in an upcoming sermon series.  It’s very timely.

     Wait, what?  Are you kidding me?  Aren’t Christians happy all the time?  They live in a perpetual Disneyland…filled with hope, and joy, and peace.  But.  We’re.  All.  Human. 

     External situations can erode our happiness.  Is it just me, or does it seem like the news is getting worse?  I’m sure, rationally, that bad things are happening every day, all around the world.  Yet it sure seems like life is getting more difficult:  another mass killing, increasing reports of abused children, gorillas and alligators grabbing our kids, not to mention the pain and suffering of Arizona heat.  And, in my opinion, the worst, most contentious election year, ever. 

     How can we remain positive in the face of all this doom and gloom, tragedy, crime, unrelenting furnace blast, and crazy politics?  I’m glad, though, that we can feel empathy for others’ suffering, or reach out in compassion to victims of abuse or crime, complain about unendurable weather, and fret over our presidential candidates.  If we didn’t experience these feelings, we would go through life in a robotic state, neither affected by negative events nor particularly lifted up by the highs of life.

     Internal conflict can demolish our happiness, too.  I’ve observed a different challenge to happiness:  when we get what we want.  What?  You mean don’t get what we want.  Nope.  How many of us have fallen victim to the discontentment that follows getting what you wanted?  I have.  You marry the man of your dreams, only to discover he’s a “fixer-upper.”  You get the child you prayed for, only to discover he’s not all clouds and rainbows when he spits out in a fit of temper, “I hate you!”  You finally qualify for your own home and the reality of mortgage payments, remodeling, and repairing broken things sets in…and you’re feeling more burdened than grateful? 

     Why do we do this…constantly seek happiness in other people and things, only to be sorely disappointed and disillusioned when we don’t discover it there…afterall, we got what we wanted, right?  We are the most confounding species. 

     Facebook can be my happiness killer.  It’s called social comparison.  I envy over photos of people’s amazing vacations to wonderful places.  Really?  You’re in China, now?  Thanks for sharing.  My wanderlust and bank account aren’t in sync, and my discontent rises. 

     I don’t have answers to the question of happiness.  Many books are written on that topic.  It’s a small comfort to know lots of people struggle with finding it, and keeping it, which is the mystery of the human condition.  I picture little Charlie Brown with his football being yanked away.  I’m looking forward to being reminded about what the Bible says about this.  We may not live in Disneyland, but I want to live more like Happy, than Grumpy.