(Should be) feeling hopeful

Photo by Miriam Espacio from Pexels

Feeling hopeful. Actually, I should be feeling hopeful given the recent US election outcome -- but my own personal life circumstances are such that I am not. I am plagued by mood swings that have gotten worse during the pandemic lock-down. This past week has been one in which I've felt a little "off."

On the one hand, I feel an impulse to externalize responsibility for how I feel -- to feel sorry for myself without acknowledging that the situation I am in is not entirely out of my control. On the other hand, I want so desperately to take control of my life so that I can shape it how I want it to be. To exert agency and set myself free of external limitations.

Unfortunately, the reality of life is that we are simultaneously agents that act upon the world -- and receivers of actions by the world upon us. We can control the former perhaps only to the extent that the latter does not stand in the way.

Presumably the reason self-help books are so popular is that people have a deep desire to take ownership for their lives. We want to shape our own futures. Self-help books and blogs help us do that. And yet at the same time, the advice is often trite. Worse, it sometimes seems like the advice is written for only certain personality types. Being a "go-getter" who pushes their way through life comes naturally to some; for others it feels like a salesperson trying to market themselves to the world. The act of "selling oneself" is in a way a kind of self de-humanization: to take the complexity of ourselves and package it in some way that the market economy values.

But is it better to at least be valued by the market economy in some narrowly-circumscribed way than to feel entirely undervalued by society? Is there a way to make meaning that honors our desire to find our place in society and contribute to it but also does not degrade us into commodities for purchase?

I don't yet know. So while I'm very happy about the election, I'm still searching for happiness... and still in the process of finding hope.