When you get sad... do what makes you happy

When things are not going your way, and everything makes you want to get back under the covers with a feel good book (a chick lit with a sappy ending, if you are like me) and a bag of chips hoping things will all get better soon. My mother was never the kind of person who was like the all American mothers you see on TV, who will discuss your problems with you, give you some really good advice on how to tackle the situation and then give you a sweet hug and tells you "everything will be alright, don't worry". Instead my mother would try to ignore me whenever I looked a little upset or sad, if she couldn't avoid me (maybe because I walked all around the house banging doors and drinking water, just so that I can bang the glass down hard and did a lot of "pich-pich", which Indians love to do when they are unhappy and a lot of changing changing channels on tv, if none of them caught my mother;s attention , it was disturbing her tv shows). So when she would finally look up and notice my sulked face, she would say "why do you go around looking like this, if someone comes in to our house and sees you like this, what will they think? Please go and look happier". There are so many things wrong on that statement! If I went to therapy, my therapist would have had a field day with it. Just with this statement alone and the issues that arise with it and making me get over them , she could have bought a huge house with a nice large yard! But looking back now, I think she unknowingly thought me a lesson in a hard cynical way. But to me back then, it made no sense, I thought she just wanted me to stay away from her and the tv and that she dint care about my problems. But now since i have become a very mature girl of 27 (read : one who makes up excuses for her mother and likes to see the positive side of things) I realize that what it meant was : I was to stop moping around and do something to make me happy. And that's what we do now, don't we? When ever we get sad, and we don't get a proper outlet for our feelings, we ignore it and do something that will make us happy. And those things, will be the silliest of things. At 7, I tried to burn down my estate by putting fire to the hay in the cow shed. When I was 11yr old with problems, I used to play dress up. At 13, I went walking with other girls so that we get noticed by all the boys that played in the neighborhood. At 16, bunking college to go shopping. At 18, bunking college to go see boys. At 20, sneaking out to go clubbing. At 22, sneaking off with the boyfriends. And now I am 27, what do I do not to make me happy? All those things that made me happy a couple of years back don't hold the same value as they used to. As we grow older it gets harder to find things that make us happy. Its not that the problems have gotten bigger. I mean when I was 13 and fell down in front of all the cute guys, I thought I wanted to die and it was the end of the world. Or may be I realize the problems are much more serious... But i continue to ignore and look for something that makes me happy. And I have realized that some days, it's very hard to find something that will make me happy, but I still keep trying - like we should!