Happiness: The Group Writing Project by Alex Shalman

April 9th, 2008 in About Me

I heard about The Happiness Project from my husband and I am excited to be a part of it and read other’s answers. Visit his page to read more about the writing project and to see other’s contributions.
http://www.alexshalman.com/blog/2008/03/01/happiness-the-group-writing-project/

  • How do you define happiness?Happiness in my life is seeing that I bring joy to other’s lives. Service to others has always helped me through hard times and bouts of depression in my life. I know myself, and what I know is when I am not feeling joy in my life that an easy fix is service. Right now as a mother to two beautiful babies, my life and service is mostly directed to them. Also supporting my husband in his dreams and goals, being a good steady force of support for him brings me happiness.
  • On a scale of 1-10, how would you rate your happiness now, versus when you were a child? As a child my happiness and sadness changed daily depending on my environment, I would say sometimes it was an 8 at the joyful times and a 2 at the hard times. Now I feel I am in a more stable healthy environment so I would rate my happiness at 8.
  • What do you do on a daily basis that brings you happiness? (and how consistent is the feeling of happiness throughout your day) Every day is full of love which bring my happiness. Love for my two daughters, caring for them, learning with them, teaching them, and being their for my husband. I love every moment of my day.
  • What things take away from your happiness? What can be done to lessen their impact or remove them from your life? Lack of sleep takes away from my happiness, disruption of my children’s routines adds stress. Lack of sleep with improve with time.
  • What do you plan on doing in the future that will bring you even more happiness? Continuing to support, be there and care for my children will continue to bring happiness to me. Also, in a few years getting to focus a little more on myself and my goals will bring me a deeper happiness I believe.
  • These questions reminded me of something I wrote in my child’s journal a few months after she was born, so I also would like to include that in my happiness post.

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    Being A Mommy…
    I get this question quite a bit, “So how do you like being a mommy?” Such a loaded question to ask so casually, so I usually answer just as casually, “It’s great!”
    I have been a mom my whole life. When I was little every night when everyone was sleeping I would go check on all of my brothers and sisters in the house. I would sing to Jonathan and Bryan while they were sleeping. I have always had a hard time sleeping, even when I was young. I was so intent on making sure that my little brothers were okay in their beds, I would constantly go to check if they were ‘still breathing’. I remember when my cousin Dallas was born, I got to watch him quite a bit for my aunt while he was very little, I would just lay him on my chest and let him listen to my heart beat, I fell in love instantly.
    Truth be told I would much rather be surrounded by children than adults, I just relate to them much easier. So simple, they love to laugh, play, just want to be lazy and cuddle when they are grumpy. You don’t ever have to really wonder what they were trying to say, or worry about what they ‘really’ think about you. During church I would always want to go help in the nursery, every new place we moved I would find families I could baby-sit for. Being around children make me, well me, I am so happy and content. I just think I am pretty simple, flying a kit and sipping a slurpie on a spring day, that’s my idea of my “perfect” day.
    I loved being a nanny, I gave my all to the families I worked for. I will always hold a special place in my heart for Sarah, Rachel, Dylan, Dallas, Tyler, Keithie, Parker, Matt, Tedders, Alex, Sophie, Mr. Max, and Nick. I miss them so much, I was heartbroken to have to move away from them. I have been waiting to have one of my own my whole life. I would always see how much they loved their moms, such a pure love. Whenever their feelings were hurt, they felt down, they had another kid call them a bad name, who do they look for? Their moms. I always wondered what it would be like to have my own love me that much.
    It’s amazing, my favorite part of the day is when I wake up. Sometimes Abby will wake up at about 4am so she will just sleep with me for a couple hours. When I wake up and open my eyes the first thing I see is this beautiful baby girl with big eyes looking up and me with such love and happiness. Every day I wake up I am so thankful. She is so happy to see me, when I get down on the floor and giggle and laugh with her, when I read her stories, when I sing her songs, when I tell her stories. Being a mom has made me, me. I feel so complete. Sure I have goals that I would like to accomplish in the next few years. But I have completed the one that means the most to me. I want to become the best mother I can and the best woman I can for my children to look up to. I have a lot of work to do and I am looking forward to it.
    So how is it to be a mommy?. This is the reply I should give, “The most amazing, beautiful, pure, lovely thing in the whole world.”

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