Does anyone else worry happiness will be detrimental to their functioning, and that they won't ever be able to sustain it?

[MrBlue]

I've been unhappy for the majority of my life, and I'm worried that I've relied on it to function, so if the impossible were to happen and my life improved, I wouldn't be able to sustain it.

I've done my best work when I've been depressed, frustrated and hyperfocused, will I lose that if I ever became happy/content with myself and my life? What if the drop in competency means I'll become unable to function at the level I'm expected to in future work/responsibilities?

In a more NSFW aspect, I've been suffering the way I am since before I hit puberty, and my sex drive so far has been pretty proportional to how depressed I've been. If the impossible did happen and someone became attracted to me enough to want a relationship, would I be able to reciprocate their feelings after the excitement/joy of a relationship kicked in?

I'm worried I'll fuck up any microscopic chance I have of a good life because I've been stuck in this pit for so long, and I won't be able to adjust to being a normal person.

Does anyone else? I'd love to hear your perspectives on it

 

[Silvermorning]

The few relationships I have had, I have sabotaged them , deep down, I feel I'dont deserve to be happy. It's complicated to get out of this self-hate circle. We are our own worse enemies.

 

[stygal]

As of late I do not even know what true happiness feels like. I had it for some time between the ages 3 to maybe 10.
Afterwards it has always been a feeling of just having to complete tasks in this overcomplicated world. Nothing gave/gives me true joy. My brain just overthinks every detail and always spoils whatever good thing I have going on for a while. So I feel like it's my "curse" to feel empty and unhappy.

This default feeling hasn't hindered me from succeeding in a job or even being in relationships though. So I guess it's possible to not live a happy life and still be "okay".

 

[ilovenightmares]

"I tried being happy once and it was awful"

I'm the opposite to you, OP, being the most productive when happy (through medication). When back into depression I looked back on that short time and hated it, now feeling embarrassed by it, do not want to go back to that again, even though I do miss the productive side of it.

 

[timf]

Humans are rather adaptable. Circumstances can change significantly and even abruptly I have known refugees from Viet Nam, some others who were in German concentration camps, and some people who try to rebuild a life after losing everything through drug use, etc.

I even knew a guy in the Army who had a job in Viet Nam of putting body parts together for shipment back to the US for burial (they did not want a white arm to be included with a black body for example). I said I did not think I would be able to handle a job like that given how the heat would accelerate decomposition. He said, In two weeks you can get used to anything. I am not sure he was exactly right, but it was an interesting perspective.

If you can find happiness, take what you can while you can. If you invest in making yourself they type of person who could make someone else happy, you might find that someone who could make you happy would be more likely to be attracted to you.

 

[nachofriend]

I feel this I've never been happy and I've used that to try and grow and make d and to find happiness I've never succeeded but I've always feared that I'd it happened I'd not know what to do with myself

 

[Albert]

I can tell you from my personal experience that you won't lose that cutting edge entirely if your life improves, but it won't be as consistent as it was before. Just like you, I've been unhappy most of my life and at times have thrived creatively off that negativity. You'll never lose the despair, it's a part of who you are, it'll only ever be mitigated by any happiness you obtain. But even that is temporary for life is suffering so you'll get the intense creative peaks followed by the drop.

As for relationships, if I can do it you can do it. I'm married with a daughter and a dog and honestly my wife is a saint for putting up with all the BS I've thrown at her in 8 years. The key to it is compartmentalization. Like an iPhone you need to sandbox your different feelings for different situations. I can fake being positive pretty well for the family and sometimes it's genuine and then when I need that spark I isolate myself and open that box of hate and despair. Just make sure to do damage control for the times it spills over because it will. Even then there's opportunity. Some of my best work has come after fighting with my wife so I make the best out of a bad situation.

This is getting long so I'll stop here, but just take comfort in the fact that one day you'll die and it'll all be over. Try to milk the fickle bitch that is life for all you can and then give it one last middle finger.

 

[Antigonish]

I've been unhappy for the majority of my life, and I'm worried that I've relied on it to function, so if the impossible were to happen and my life improved, I wouldn't be able to sustain it.

I've done my best work when I've been depressed, frustrated and hyperfocused, will I lose that if I ever became happy/content with myself and my life? What if the drop in competency means I'll become unable to function at the level I'm expected to in future work/responsibilities?

In a more NSFW aspect, I've been suffering the way I am since before I hit puberty, and my sex drive so far has been pretty proportional to how depressed I've been. If the impossible did happen and someone became attracted to me enough to want a relationship, would I be able to reciprocate their feelings after the excitement/joy of a relationship kicked in?

I'm worried I'll fuck up any microscopic chance I have of a good life because I've been stuck in this pit for so long, and I won't be able to adjust to being a normal person.

Does anyone else? I'd love to hear your perspectives on it

Misery loves company, I've always liked that statement. I write; poems, stories, music, and etc. And I do it best when I'm in an emotional state. And my most inspirational state is sadness/loss. So sometimes I seek it *the pain* to spark my thoughts. Sometimes I isolate myself to feel the music. Sometimes I hurt myself to feel what I'm lacking. I too am way down in that deep abyss, and unfortunately I love it.

Now when it comes to relationships, do them. It'll be okay to fuck a couple of them, but it'll be worth it if you find one that works for you. Worry and anxiety are the worst inhibitors, trust me I know. But it might help if you find someone who is as self destructive as yourself. Personally I cant have interest in anyone who isn't in some way dysfunctional. It's my fear of corrupting an innocent, or fucking them up with my mental irregularities. It takes a certain type of person to handle me.

So it helps to change the scope of the type of person you're looking for. Look more closer to your side of the line. And always know, that if you've done some of your best while being unhappy, then maybe there isn't a reason to improve. I too was born unhappy, and in an ironic way, I've found happiness in the fact. I've always thought melancholia was a beautiful word, every sense I first heard it and learned its meaning at the age of 6.

 

[greebo6]

When you are so used to sadness happiness can seem a prospect too scary and alien to handle....….
The depressive cynic in me would make me wonder if I could actually sustain it ,would I feel even worse when it went wrong and would it be worth it.
That's maybe the saddest part of all about depression and anxiety. It stops you even trying.

 

[Weather]

Have you read Sara Ahmed's The Promise of Happiness? I assign part of it every year in one of the classes I teach. Part of it is a discussion of happiness objects -- that once we attain something (e.g., good job, marriage, etc.), that we have been taught this will provide happiness. But it doesn't, or if it does, it is fleeting. Because happiness is an emotion, a temporary state -- not something we can have indefinitely. So, we search out the next happiness object as if that one will be it, and go through the cycle again. My point is: even if depression can be overcome, what you are left with is the absence of depression, not happiness. Happiness is fleeting, even for the best of us. It's a good feeling, not something we can become. It's not permanent for anyone.

That said, I am always my most productive when I am most mentally well (e.g., not depressed/anxious). I remember, as a dreamy high school/undergrad student, I had those self-indulgent feelings that my writing could only be "good" if I was depressed; like, I could only see the human condition if I was feeling like sh*t. I mean, it's a thing, right? We read about Sylvia Plath, Hemingway, David Foster Wallace, etc. -- and decide that mental illness is what gave them their writing prowess. But that's nonsense; they were able to work in spite of their issues (often during brief remissions), not because of it.

What I mean to say: when you are not expending so much energy on mental health issues, you will be amazed what you can accomplish.