Me and My Unhappiness

On relearning the cause for joy

It was a shock to discover that I did not want to be happy. It should not have been, but it was. I thought I wanted to be happy - I thought that's what I was trying to do with my life, all the therapy and learning and praying and whatnot - but I was wrong.

Unhappiness was more valuable to me than happiness because being a victim was more valuable than being responsible. I did not want to acknowledge my agency, much less any ethic engendered by it. Being unhappy allowed me to continue to judge and blame others (up to and including God) for my state of mind and the state of the world.

The illusion is that unhappiness is an effect. I'm unhappy because of what's happening outside of me. But in fact unhappiness is a decision to accept without question the lie that you and I have separate interests, live in a world with scarce-and-getting-scarcer resources, and are bound to fight to the death for those resources.

Unhappiness generates a world in which nobody ever wins; some of us just lose slower than others. It is a painful way to live but somehow we convince ourselves that becoming happy is even more painful.

This is why a central pillar of A Course in Miracles is understanding that the secret to salvation is that we are doing this - "this" being suffering- to ourselves (T-27.VIII.10:1).

Imagine a river. Every morning you wake up and walk to the river and the banks are strewn with trash. So each morning you clean it up. Very noble! Very pretty result!

Next morning, the trash is back.

This goes on for a long time but eventually you realize the problem isn't your section of the river - it's something upstream. So you set you to find the source of the trash.

It takes a while - there are thorns, there is deadfall - but one day you reach the lake that is the river's source. And it's full of trash. Somebody is dumping all their junk and letting the river carry it away. Filled with righteous anger, you find their trail and follow it . . .

. . . right back to your place downriver. You are the one doing the littering. You are littering and you are denying that you are littering.

You are doing this to your own self.

The trash is psychological. It's our guilt and fear, our bitterness and hatred, our depression and anxiety, our cravings and addictions. It's literally everything that blocks our awareness of love. We project it - that's the littering part - and then deny we are doing it. Denial is forgetfulness. We are locked in a cycle of projection and denial so vicious it has literally separated us from God and creation.

Whatever seems to be the cause of any pain and suffering you feel, this is still true. For you would not react at all to figures in a dream you knew that you were dreaming. Let them be as hateful and as ficious as they may, they could have no effect on you unless you failed to recognize it is your dream (T-27.VIII.10:4-6).

We don't automatically become happy upon this realization! Rather, we become responsible. Once we see the projection and denial - which includes undertanding both how and why it functions - then it is no longer possible to blame others for anything. We can try - and we do, a lot - but the jig is up.

In truth, the Thetfordian other way is always clear. If we are doing this, then we can stop doing it. We can stop polluting the river and the river will be clear and unhindered. We can become happy.

The alternative to projection and denial is to sit quietly with the Holy Spirit and bring to Him each instance of anger, hurt and confusion. Rather than attack our brothers and sisters, we give it all to Him. This is what it means to lay down our defenses. Projection and denial are a defense against love, and the only thing to do with a defense is to lay it down. There is nothing to fight; our work is the work of acceptance and non-resistance.

Whatever hurt you bring to Him He will make answer with this very simple truth. For this one answer takes away the cause of every form of sorrow and of pain. The form affects His answer not at all, for He would teach you but the single cause of all of them, no matter what their form. And you will understand that miracles reflect the simple statement, "*I* have done this thing, and it is this I would undo" (T-27.VIII.11:3-6).

When I began to actively stop projecting - to notice when I was doing it and then to not do it - my relationship with myself changed. My understanding of myself changed. I became happier not because of what I was doing but because of what I was not doing. My relationship with others changed as well. They became less about what I could get, and more about what we could share.

How differently will you perceive the world when this is recognized! When you forgive the world your guilt, you will be free of it (T-27.VIII.13:1-2).

Healing begins in honesty. It is hard to admit that we are invested in suffering, attached to victimhood and indifferent to the misery of our brothers and sisters. Yet not until I acknowledged my commitment to unhappiness could I begin to do the work of becoming happy. And truly, there is no other work for us to do.

Thank you always for being here and sharing this path with me.

Love,
Sean