#qfh

I came to this realization one day in February of this year, sitting alone in my dorm room at 8:00 pm on a Thursday night after yet another marathon session of extreme studying. The past few months had been incredibly rough for me. I was isolated from all of my friends, because I was working hard on class work and extra-curriculars. I hadn't been home in about 2 months, I hadn't seen my parents or my dog. I hadn't really talked to anyone in a long time. I was rapidly gaining back all the weight I had lost since college started, my sanity was slipping through the cracks. I was keeping up with everything I needed to do, I was working hard, and I was getting great results. 

But in the chase for this success, I had completely lost my happiness. I was lonely, sad, and exhausted. I felt… pointless. What is success in a life without significance?

This night, I was at my desk alone, eating ice cream and watching Netflix, when a scene reminded me of a song and I flitted over to YouTube to listen to it. Naturally, I fell down a rabbit hole and was about 9 videos deep when I watched the Befikre song music video. 

In that moment, something happened, something clicked in my brain. I must have figured it out, that doing what I was "supposed" to do wasn't going to mean anything if it wasn't what I wanted to do, if it wasn't what was going to make me happy. I decided to be Befikre.

To stop caring about ifs and buts and stop tugging at the little threads poking out of my sweater. To stop pretending, to stop being so scared, to stop chasing the wrong things. 

I figured, whatever's going to happen will happen, and I can't do anything about the things outside of my control. So, I should just keep playing the person, playing the situation, instead of playing the cards I'm getting dealt, and I should keep myself happy. 

Thus was born the Quest For Happiness™. 

The project has been a few months in the making. Up 'til now, it has been a lot of unabashed self-discovery. Asking difficult questions about who I am, who I want to be, and how I'm going to get there. Wrestling with the sly, cold moth that has its legs firmly gripped around my heart (Arundathi Roy) and telling it to let go. It's been an active effort to remind myself to shoulder shrug (Kevin Hart) the shit that I can’t control. It's been grueling and mind-twisting to understand what happiness even is. 

But I'm starting to get the hang of it. At the very least, I'm ready to commit to this journey. 

This project, then, is going to be a labor of love, a passion project, where I try to understand happiness, where it comes from and how to create it for myself. Over the next few years, I will get to the roots of the Philosophy of Happiness to understand it for myself and maybe help others see a perspective on it as well.

I have absolutely no clue what this project will entail. I have not a single idea where it will take me or what it'll produce. But even if I don’t know how something is going to end, it doesn't mean I can't enjoy the ride. And that's what life is all about–enjoying the ride, and figuring shit out as you go. Trust in the process. What I do know is that questing for happiness is an active effort. It takes daily focus to redirect myself away from bad energy and toward positivity. And the way to keep yourself on track is to hold yourself accountable. 

That's where this project comes in. My hope is to populate this blog with my Quest, to document the moments I have and discoveries I make, so I can reflect on them, but so that you can, as well. The point, along with trying to understand where happiness comes from, is to pursue happiness. So, every week, I hope I can take time out and share something new, or something old, I did that brought me joy, content, fullness, or happiness. 

The "rules" are simple:

I will post weekly - in the course of 7 days, there HAS to be something I did that made me happy. It doesn't need to be some giant event. It could be as simple as cooking myself a nice meal, or doing my hair in a different way, or writing something witty, or having a quick conversation with someone I missed. Because, "There's beauty in ordinary things, and isn't that kind of the point?" - Pam, from the Office.

I will get real - this quest is about finding authentic happiness. That means no faking. That means no academic language that perpetuates a clinical separation from the topic at hand. No big words used as a cop-out from actually understanding real feelings and emotions. This quest will be real, in every sense of the word. I'm actually going on this journey, and I hope you'll come along with me. But if you don't, that's cool. This is for me, and it's out here for you to see too.   

The project will actively unfold here, on Tumblr. This is where the posts will be. But it will expand across all of my social media profiles. I'll post pictures, recap moments, share videos, articles, links, quotes, and all that pertain to this quest. Keep an eye out for #QuestForHappiness, as I'm sure you've already seen before, to see where the Quest takes me. 

The project will span across adventuring, health and fitness, friends and family, learning kindness, and the philosophy of happiness. But it's a living, breathing project, and I'm sure it will morph into whatever shape it needs to take.