Is This the End of Happiness?

happiness hack #3, learning from writers, a writing prompt + July Writing Hour

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If you want to skip right to the prompt, without any preliminaries or wordy words from me, scroll on down to the heading: a writing prompt.

I’m three weeks into this summer series and already I’m tired of it. My inspiration article sounds too click-baity: 10 Healthy Habits of Happy People. Right? It’s not really clickbait, though it is produced by a company selling stuff. It’s got good information, links to more reading, and all that I’ve read so far resonates.

But I don’t want to link to it and write about it for more weeks. To be honest, I’ve asked myself: is a series on happiness on brand for me? (To be extra honest, I don’t really know what on brand means, but it makes me sound like I know what I’m doing business-wise, which I mostly don’t.)

My work these days is largely about helping people write about what matters to them. A fair number find me through a connection with grief and want to explore how writing can be a tool for healing. It’s a particular privilege to write with those who put pen to paper from a place of loss. And isn’t that all of us who write about our lives—wrestling with love, memory, pain, and possibility?

I know from 20 years of practice that reflective writing—writing that helps you get words out of your head and heart and onto a page where you can see and hear and deal with them—that kind of writing can be a long winding path to deep pools of joy even if you start in (and keep circling around) a swirling vortex. But I wouldn’t say it’s happy sunshine and rainbow-writing all the time.

If I were a subscriber looking for writing prompts—no matter my starting place—would ten weeks of a happiness hacks series annoy me?

Probably.

I thought of it and I’m already a little annoyed. Which begs the question: who is this series for, really?

Some experts (the kind who know what on brand means) say we should have one person in mind that we’re writing for—like an avatar of a reader. Some days I suppose that’s one of you lovelies who have written with me in a workshop, or who comment here. But the truth is, on many days—it’s me, hi. I’m writing for myself, first. No avatar. Just middle-aged me who is grateful to have learned about the power of writing, is still learning how to harness the magic, and by-the-way wants to help you learn it too. I don’t have an organized content calendar, or weeks of stored-up posts ready to go. I choose my weekly prompts like I choose my Wordle starting words—I go with whatever is on my mind when I sit down to play.

Four weeks ago when I pitched the idea to myself, I liked my plan of hacking happiness and health and writing about it. I still want to be happy and healthy—who doesn’t? But I’m feeling all kinds of ways about a whole host of things swirling around the vortex these days, and I want to respond to those writing urges when they spill over. So after today, I’m freeing myself (and you!) from me-mandated weeks on end of writing about happiness. Let’s all head into the rest of the summer without that pressure.

So, the final happiness hack for now: be a lifelong learner

Supposedly, happy and healthy people keep learning. They “choose a growth mindset” (are these also on brand people?) and they try new challenges. Here’s what the bloomin’ article says: “Blogs, books, poetry, podcasts, documentaries, music, foreign languages, software, workshops, university courses, creative activities––it’s all good, as long as you challenge yourself to leave a comfort zone, keep your mind engaged, explore new things, and allow your creativity to bloom.”¹

I’ve learned plenty, just in this last week, just from other writers on Substack:

• Generous advice on daily rituals from Charlene Storey to “Slow it down. Make it nice. Fill your cup.”

• A grace-filled breath prayer from Miranda Peebles to help let go of old guilt over mothering and medical history: “Inhale. It’s time. Exhale. I’m ready.”

• The power of writing a tender story of loss in the third person from Lindsay Johnstone: “Perhaps I wrote it as a story because I wished it was one? Perhaps I wrote it in the third person because I wished I wasn’t her?”

• A wealth of wisdom from Elissa Altman on what she’s learned in sixty years. Like:

  • Pick up the phone and call. Even if it weighs 9,000 pounds.

  • Drink far more water than you think you need to.

  • If you don’t heal the trauma, it will take up permanent residence in your body.

  • Wear the good jewelry.

I’m also learning from other writers and poets, about what they have learned:

One Eventual

after fifty years of spinning 
I learn standing still 
is another way to dance 

—Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer 

“You will lose someone you can’t live without, and your heart will be badly broken, and the bad news is that you never completely get over the loss of your beloved. But this is also the good news. They live forever in your broken heart that doesn’t seal back up. And you come through. It’s like having a broken leg that never heals perfectly—that still hurts when the weather gets cold, but you learn to dance with the limp.” 
― Anne Lamott in Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith

The Avowal

As swimmers dare 
to lie face to the sky 
and water bears them, 
as hawks rest upon air 
and air sustains them, 
so would I learn to attain 
freefall, and float 
into Creator Spirit’s deep embrace, 
knowing no effort earns 
that all-surrounding grace. 

—Denise Levertov 

Maria Shriver: One line of yours I often quote is, "What is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?" What do you think you have done with your one wild and precious life?  

Mary Oliver: I used up a lot of pencils. 

Maria Shriver: [Laughs.]  

Mary Oliver: What I have done is learn to love and learn to be loved. That didn't come easy. And I learned to consider my life an amazing gift. Those are the things.²

a writing prompt

What have you learned lately, or over a long time? What are you still learning?

What’s on brand for you, this summer?

Try writing in the third person, if you like. “She is learning….”

Let your words flow on the page, without editing, and see what you learn from yourself.

a bonus poem prompt about learning

Want

The wasps outside 
the kitchen window 
are making that 
thick, unraveling sound 
again, floating in 
and out of the bald head 
of their nest, 
seeming not to move 
while moving, 
and it has just occurred 
to me, standing, 
washing the coffeepot, 
watching them hang 
loosely in the air—thin 
wings; thick, elongated 
abdomens; sad, down— 
pointing antennae— 
that this 
is the heart’s constant 
project: this simple 
learning; learning 
how to hold 
hopelessness 
and hope together; 
to see on the unharmed 
surface of one 
the great scar 
of the other; to recognize 
both and to make 
something of both; 
to desire everything 
and nothing 
at once and to desire it 
all the time; 
and to contain that desire 
fleshly, in a body; 
to wash it and rest it 
and feed it; to learn 
its name and from whence 
it came; and to speak 
to it—oh, most of all 
to speak to it— 
every day, every day, 
saying to one part, 
“Well, maybe this is all 
you get,” while saying 
to the other, “Go on, 
break it open, let it go.” 

—Carrie Fountain, from Burn Lake

July Writing Hour - Saturday, July 15 at 4 pm Eastern

My next live writing hour on Zoom for paid subscribers is on Saturday, July 15 at 4 pm Eastern. If you want to write in company with others, you are welcome to join us. You can upgrade your subscription for a month ($7) just to try it. A separate email to paid subscribers will go out that week with the link, or you can find it on my Substack tab called Writing Hours. Let’s write together.

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Let me know what you think about the prompt, or come back and add some of what you write in the comments. Know someone who might enjoy this prompt or others? Please share!

Photo by D Jonez on Unsplash

1. https://www.intelligentchange.com/blogs/read/10-healthy-habits-of-happy-people

2. from this interview for O Magazine