A reader asks Matt what his method is for attaining happiness.

Matt responds:

Finding happiness is probably an oxymoron.  I believe we experience happiness, but one person’s happiness is another person’s despair.

The realization of happiness, I believe, is to many people an acquired taste.

Rose and I have talked for years about people who aren’t happy unless they’re unhappy in the eyes of the world.

It’s the “Woe is me” syndrome.  “Look at poor me, why am I so distressed?”

Well, it’s usually because you feel better distressed.  You’re unhappy when other people are happy, and your happiness comes from being in despair about something that probably doesn’t mean squat!

Happiness is a decision.  I often say that when everyone is losing their mind and you are happy and gay, maybe you don’t understand the situation.  Maybe the situation is just a lot of nothing swirling around, pretending to be something.

No matter how bad things are, eventually, because of the human gene structure, you get over it—changed for better or worse, but it’s over.

In this plane that we now live in, nothing is forever.  Everything is transitory.  We can go from being very happy to being very sad.

Happiness to some people might be running out of a burning house being happy they don’t have to pay the mortgage anymore because the damn thing is burning down.

I had a friend who was asked, “What was the happiest day of your life?” and he always responded, “When the last kid got married and the dog died.”

Which is very macabre, although I suppose it was a truthful answer on his part.

Happiness comes in many shapes and forms.  If you recognize it, it can be obtained for the asking.

Matt