Life is hard, and sometimes very unfair. The life we dreamed of as a little girl, a husband, a family and a white picket fence has not materialized.
Instead we are working long hours, taking care of our children alone, and that white picket fence? We are just happy to have a place to sleep at night.
Life is not fair, but it doesn’t have to be all doom and gloom. I believe that happiness is a choice. Every day when I wake up, I make the choice to be happy. The car is making a funny noise? Thank goodness I have people to help me, and if all else fails, I can take a bus to work and walk to the grocery store.
Your happiness is really determined by your attitude. Yes, it’s hard to have a positive outlook all the time but if you think about all the time you moped around thinking life was terrible, most of the time things turned out pretty well.
As a single mother sometimes I feel like the deck is stacked against me. There is too much for one person to do, too many demands on my time, and too much of my daughters life that I’m missing.
When I was married was when I truly realized that happiness was a choice. I was in a bad marriage to a man who was not very nice to me, but I had a home, a job, good friends, a wonderful family and an amazing child, so I was happy. My ex husband on the other hand was miserable, not because of the things he had, but because of the things he didn’t and felt entitled to. I remember saying to him once, we have the same life, how can you be so miserable? That’s when I realized it was his choice to be miserable.
Every day, I choose happiness. We only get to go through this life once and I want to find all the joy I can. At the end of my life I don’t want to look back and see misery, I want to see a life well and joyfully lived.
My life is not perfect, no one’s is, but it’s the life I have and it’s pretty wonderful. There are days when I kick the dirt and complain that life is not fair, fortunately those days are few and far between. I am blessed in so many ways. Even being a single mother is a blessing in its own way. I wouldn’t change a thing.