Remember the wisdom spoken by character Mike Brady in the film The Brady Bunch? Mike says, “Remember, wherever you go, there you are.” And so, the advice to find one’s “happy place” mentally during times of stress, according to Mike, is difficult at best.
Sure, we all have ways of dealing with stressful situations: Anger, drinking, drugging, eating, withdrawing…,each method a different mechanism for avoiding reality. But in most circumstances for most people, “finding one’s happy place” mentally is like those other methods of avoidance, a temporary distraction. As A. E. Housman wrote in “Terence, This Is Stupid Stuff”:
Oh I have been to Ludlow fair
And left my necktie God knows where,
And carried half way home, or near,
Pints of quarts of Ludlow beet;
Then the world seemed none so bad,
And I myself a sterling lad;
And down in lovely muck I’ve lain,
Happy till I woke again.
Then I saw the morning sky;
Heigho, the tale was all a lie;
The world, it was the old world yet,
I was I, my things were wet,
And nothing now remained to do
But begin the game anew.
As “the world” continuously bombards you with stressful situations, remember Mr. Brady’s line. You are where you are at any moment. That’s the reality of life. Dealing with whatever causes the stress is a more effective way of relieving that stress than, say, drinking quarts of Ludlow beer and awakening to the same reality that drove you to escapist anger, drinking, eating, or withdrawing. If you lie down in a stressed-caused stupor, you will eventually awake muddy and wet, and the “world” will be “the old world yet.”
Churchill, England’s PM during WWII, said upon learning of the Allied victory in Africa, “Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.” Overcoming the “beginning” of any stressful circumstance by seeing it as a reality is better than trying to find one’s “happy place” outside that reality. We are where we are. This is the place; now is the time.
Too often we choose to lie in “lovely muck.” Too many of us choose Ludlow fair as a better place than where we are. That “happy place” some advise you to find during times of stress is a muddy ditch. You will awake.
Sure, we all have ways of dealing with stressful situations: Anger, drinking, drugging, eating, withdrawing…,each method a different mechanism for avoiding reality. But in most circumstances for most people, “finding one’s happy place” mentally is like those other methods of avoidance, a temporary distraction. As A. E. Housman wrote in “Terence, This Is Stupid Stuff”:
Oh I have been to Ludlow fair
And left my necktie God knows where,
And carried half way home, or near,
Pints of quarts of Ludlow beet;
Then the world seemed none so bad,
And I myself a sterling lad;
And down in lovely muck I’ve lain,
Happy till I woke again.
Then I saw the morning sky;
Heigho, the tale was all a lie;
The world, it was the old world yet,
I was I, my things were wet,
And nothing now remained to do
But begin the game anew.
As “the world” continuously bombards you with stressful situations, remember Mr. Brady’s line. You are where you are at any moment. That’s the reality of life. Dealing with whatever causes the stress is a more effective way of relieving that stress than, say, drinking quarts of Ludlow beer and awakening to the same reality that drove you to escapist anger, drinking, eating, or withdrawing. If you lie down in a stressed-caused stupor, you will eventually awake muddy and wet, and the “world” will be “the old world yet.”
Churchill, England’s PM during WWII, said upon learning of the Allied victory in Africa, “Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.” Overcoming the “beginning” of any stressful circumstance by seeing it as a reality is better than trying to find one’s “happy place” outside that reality. We are where we are. This is the place; now is the time.
Too often we choose to lie in “lovely muck.” Too many of us choose Ludlow fair as a better place than where we are. That “happy place” some advise you to find during times of stress is a muddy ditch. You will awake.
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