Eternal Pursuit

"If you want to be happy, set a goal that commands your thoughts, liberates your energy, and inspires your hopes."

Andrew Carnegie

If happiness is nothing other than setting a goal and fulfilling it, when we reach that goal, what then? We can look at happiness in the same vein as we look at hunger.

We can assuage that need by feeding ourselves but no matter how satiated the stomach, hunger will always find its way back.

Up until death, that is. And one might say something along the lines of "well, I once went almost a whole week without a bite because I was quite depressed" but what is that if not death in spirit? Even then, though, hunger does return.

Regardless, what is happiness?

I often fool myself with the old carrot in the stick trick of telling myself I will be happy once I achieve all my goals. Goals are reached and I set new goals for myself. I seek that thrill of achievement, however passing as it may be.

I wonder if I will truly be happy once I reach all my goals and stop placing more goals on top of that. Will I complete my self-imposed tasks and be happy, or will I continue the cycle of it all until death of body and/or spirit?

Often when I become too aware of this never ending cycle, I'm filled with an enormous feeling of dread and don't know how to manage my anxieties.

And yet I chase my heart away, hoping I might be mistaken in the logical assumption that happiness is but a never ending game of cat and mouse, with a mouse that lives only in the memories of the cat. I allow myself to, every so often, feel the sun on my face.

I stand there, and the sun hits just right.

The sky paints the right shade of purple and blue.

And even when you are unaware of the position of all objects in the cosmos, choose to believe the planets have aligned.

Every so often, that moment comes and I can't help but to stop and try to take it in.

And with as much anticipation as that happiness arrives, so it leaves.

I begin thinking that maybe if I start waking up early more often I'll see this sky more.

And then I begin to look aback.

I reminisce of that time on that rooftop of another city and think it special. "If I visit that place again I'll know what made it so, and thus be closer to a full sense of happiness."

And I often fall under that impression. That in which I revisit the same scenery and I better understand the source of my well being.

Maybe the places I frequented when I felt at peace are the source of my peace.

If I approach the same people I once frequented when I felt at peace, I'll be just as peaceful.

And if all else fails, maybe then I would have something or someone to blame for my unhappiness besides myself.

Yeah. That might just be it. It's the place and time that's to blame for this recurring emptiness.

I don't have to work for it if I know it's the distance from that rooftop that keeps the corner of my mouth anchored down.

I am anchored in a sea of uneasiness not by my own volition, but by a myriad of factors beyond my control. Obviously the chain on my ankle keeps me drowned.

Except, it's not quite so.

My happiness is neither here nor there.

And so is (or isn't) my emptiness.

Nowhere.

And everywhere. And it's only then that I begin to help others. That I begin to latch onto the notion that if I do enough good for others something good will sprout out of me.

If I hear enough thanks, and I create enough smiles, mine will surge just as naturally. Only in my deepest hollow, do I feel a drive to do good for others.

In Fromsoft's Dark Souls, there was this character I always latched on to. His name is Solaire of Astora. This man wants nothing other than to feel the sun on his face and help you in your journey. If you take the right path, he will follow you all the way up to the end and gain nothing in return. There is no way to thank him, nor to help him on his quest (for he doesn't seem to have one). Right after meeting him, he gives you the tools to summon him in battle and stays behind to gaze at the sun. "The sun is a wondrous body," he says. "Like a magnificent father! If only I could be so grossly incandescent!" If only, right?