Lately, I have been wondering about my innate desire to seek happiness and overcome my obstacles. I am generally an optimistic person who looks on the bright side of every situation. Although, I rarely get depressed I do tend to be deeply affected by work. I am prone to getting physically ill from stressful situations at work. I accept the bad things that come into my life not always graciously but I find a way to deal. This led me to start thinking about all these bad feelings I have been having. Being so busy all the time, unhappy, working a lot at home after hours, getting lazy about cooking healthy and so on…I even would attribute my back problems to this negativity.

So, I thought that I would list the things I find most dissatisfying about my life and see if by doing this I can divest myself of whatever angst or unhappiness I am carrying.

1. I am unhappy at work. I love the people in my immediate group and the perks and benefits. But I am so, very unhappy. I don’t like the person I am becoming or the people I am working with outside of my circle of friends and colleagues. I wish I was being adequately compensated for what I am doing. I want more emotional fulfillment. I want to go to work happy, excited. I want what I do to mean something and to matter. I miss working in academia. I miss seeing the fruits of my work, helping others.

2. I wish I wasn’t constantly obsessed with the debt we have amassed (low double-digits). It seems that all my motivation focuses on this. Paying it off, not spending on X because I could pay down our debt instead. This weighs heavily on my mind. I just want it to be gone already. But I wonder if it is gone, won’t I find something else to fret about, to replace that debt either literally or metaphorically? I have been fantasizing, hoping that we can take a nice 6-8 week trip traveling for our 10th anniversary. Of course, I find no true enjoyment in these thoughts because of our debt, and the fact that this would add too it. To add more insult to my already raw feelings, I know that we have thought about starting a family after this trip.

3. Having a family scares me for a number of reasons. The obvious, whether I will be a good parent, having a healthy baby, how will our marriage change, will we be happier…but I am terrified that we will continue our check to check behavior we currently exhibit. To be honest I am embarrassed about the amount we make and still seem to be struggling, guilty about spending money on shoes we need or so forth. We have made some big decisions to try to combat our financial woes, deciding not to buy another car and carpooling but I can’t shake my childhood feelings. I still think back to the images of my mom struggling to provide me with things, school opportunities and so on…these thoughts linger in my mind. Will we ever catch up? Make enough money to raise a child and still manage to enjoy ourselves without the stress? We have talked about BozoBoy becoming a stay-at-home dad. Of course, this is a factor when trying to improve our financial situation.

What I have realized is that I am far too obsessed about money, making more, paying off what I have spent, and thinking about what I don’t have. I am just so tired of these thoughts. I need to let go. I meant will I really have a life where I won’t have some debt? I doubt it somehow…even if it is minimal. Do I want/need help in working these problems out? Absolutely! Do I know where to look? Not exactly, but I am trying. I am trying to let go of certain ideals and desires that may in fact be causing me pain. I want to end what I feel is contributing to my own suffering. More importantly, I am on a mission to find the roots of my own happiness and focus on those. I believe this could have a significant change on my attitude and hopefully on my outlook of the future.