There’s no happily ever after in any story unless you’re happy. Let’ start there.
Those 3 elusive words. Happily Ever After.
Whether it’s novels, movies or life, most people would say the end goal is a “Happily Ever After” or an “HEA”.
For many, especially women, images of what this means have been overflowing our minds, conditioning its very definition. Generally, most would agree, it goes something like; The Princess, the Prince, the Fairytale. The Happily Ever After.
But with so much emphasis on finding something or needing someone in order to feel fulfilled or to be truly happy, it’s no wonder we struggle to identify that happiness is not universally defined rather individually determined. A simple scroll on social media on any given day and you might think happiness is a picture-perfect home, the wedding, the white picket fence, the seven figure salary, the six-pack, the sports car, the Gucci bag and I could go on and on and on!!
The beauty of happiness is that at its very core or it’s meaning is “the state of being happy”. Being is not past or future tense. Being is present. Happy is not some ending, rather a living. It’s ok to want your happily ever after, whatever that means to you, but let’s start to focus on knowing and living life by what makes you happy rather than what you’ve been told will make you feel happy or what someone else on the gram decides happiness is.
Happily ever after is achievable when you’re filling each day, living life, on your own terms based on what makes you happy. This is a reminder, especially on the difficult days or when we feel like we’re missing something that we’ve been told can bring us happiness, that it can only exist if you’re happy first. Let’s start there. And let’s try not think about it as an ending, rather a beginning every day.
Wishing you a lifetime full of HEAs no matter what chapter of your story you’re living.