The Search for "Real" Happiness

I've been searching for "real" happiness pretty much all my life.  I've spent far too much time comparing my everyday experiences to the moments that I thought were the benchmark of happy people.  Moments.  Moments, to me, were...Christmas morning, birthday celebrations, vacations, the intoxicating rush of a new love, the "I do" from the one you love with all your heart, a baby born...all those moments that seemed to define real happiness.  

After 36 years, I'm learning that those are not the moments that bring real happiness.  Indeed, the moments that bring real happiness are the everyday moments that you experience and think nothing of at the time.  I was confusing events with moments, and considering events as the only way to be happy.  Everything else was just a time filler in between the events...days, weeks, and months marked off the calendar just waiting for the next rush of happiness to be found at the next big day.  The chase was making me anxious and leaving me thoroughly exhausted, and I was missing out on most of my life just waiting for the few events that I believed to be the very best, the most intoxicating, the happiest.  

Don't get me wrong...all of those big days and special events have their place, and it's an amazing place.  I'll never forget the first time I kissed the first man I ever loved...my husband.  I'll never forget when my husband looked into my eyes and said "I Do" with his eyes glistening.  Though it hasn't happened yet, I know I won't ever forget the moment when I first lay eyes on our beautiful baby.  And those vacations, and birthdays, and Christmas mornings?  They are precious memories.  

But in the end, when I look back on my life, it's the little moments that actually meant the most.  It's laying my head in my husband's lap and crying when I'm at my breaking point and just need someone to tell me it's okay...and he tells me that it will be.  It's when I'm all alone at the edge of the ocean and I breathe in the smell of salty air and possibilities.  It's when my little nephew tells me a really corny joke and then laughs the laugh of a thirteen year old that is growing up faster than I want him to.  It's when I step into an elevator by myself and ride it to the floor I need to get to, and I don't panic.  It's when I create a scrapbook page that I know will live on and tell our stories when I'm long gone.  It's when I write, and reread my words, and realize that my very soul has been poured onto the page for the whole world to see.  It's when I realize I'm okay with the whole world seeing those words.  

It's when someone writes me and says that because of my page, they don't feel so alone in their battle with anxiety anymore.  

Those are the moments that make me happy.  It's a very different feeling than what I experience during those big events...it's more of a quiet, peaceful feeling.  During the events, it's as if a wave is crashing over me and engulfing me in it.  I feel as overwhelmed by them as I do happy, and then there is the crash afterwards when the event is over and it's back to my day-to-day life.

The moments?  They're...different.  It's as if I'm being covered in a warm blanket, and the happiness sneaks up slowly.  It's a peaceful feeling of contentment that settles into my soul, not at all abrasive or overwhelming, but lovely and calm.  And when I slow down, I realize it's there...the happiness.  It's there.  And it's everything I always wanted it to be.

What about you?  Do you define happiness?  Does the search for it define you?