It Will Be Okay

I feel like I should write something pithy and political, since we’re about to elect our next President.  On the other hand, I feel like I would be speaking to an empty room.  Many of us have already voted.  Most who haven’t had their minds made up long ago.  Some lazy fuckers aren’t voting at all.  Those who are undecided are hopeless.  If you haven’t gotten enough information to decide by now, God bless ya, you indecisive little pop tart. 

This all leaves, however, the looming spectre of dissatisfaction and loss that’s going to settle over about half of the people, come Tuesday night. And while I hope and hope that it’s not the Barack H. Obama side that is dissatisfied, I’m trying to steel myself to the possibility that I could be one of the disappointed ones.  And trying to figure out how I’m going to manage a world with President Romney.  Even if this election goes as I hope it will, I will still have friends and neighbors who are deeply disappointed, and I’ve been trying to figure out how to navigate these tender times.  Democracy is weird – it’s a dirty game, but once a winner’s been called, we all make the decision to live with it.  It’s a surprising bit of civility after a cagefight. 

But I think I have a solution to all of this angst, courtesy of my favorite ex-President, Bill Clinton, spoken to my favorite tiny human, Jon Stewart.  When Clinton was on the Daily Show, he posed the idea that, instead of looking for happiness in our daily lives, we should all seek joy instead.

What’s the difference between happiness and joy?  Well, according to the internet, happiness comes from the Hebrew word ashar, and means, “to set right or be blessed.”  Joy comes from the Greek word chara, and means, “To be exceedingly glad.”  Happiness tends to be momentary and replaceable, while joy, although not as dramatic, is more constant and internal.  Don’t get me wrong, happiness is great.  But with joy, there’s a deep sense that “this, too, shall pass,” even in the shittiest of circumstances.

When I see crap out there like the Real Housewives and Jersey Shore, and even a number of people I know in my real life, I am so flabbergasted by the single-minded quest for happiness that people have, and how unsatisfying it must be to acquire so many things, and so many empty relationships, but to be so transparently unhappy.  And I wonder, if we all just shut up for a minute, and started thinking about who we are, rather than what we want, if this wouldn’t start to instantly make things better.  I mean, if we deeply questioned ourselves, asking, “What do I know?  What do I not know?  What do I believe?  Why do I believe that?  How can I do good?  Am I doing good?” we might actually come up with some answers that help us find peace. 

I think this is complicated, and I suspect that joy is a life-long practice, like golf, or religion, but I definitely know that we all have an opportunity to practice it on Tuesday night.  If you’re on the winning side, resist your urge to go scream, “In your face, motherfucker!” to your asshole neighbor with the twenty million signs in his yard, and instead, think about how you can help your friends who are just as scared and grieving as you would be if you were on the losing side.  And if your side loses, take comfort in the fact that you’re not alone, and that our greatest power comes from who we are as people, not necessarily who sits in the White House.  Okay?  Okay.