In America we are obsessed with individual happiness. Like, obsessed. From the Declaration of Independence to prosperity gospel to the multi-billion dollar self-care industry, personal happiness has become less of an experience and more of a measure. Happiness has become something that is deeply individualistic, and serves as a sign that you are doing something right. Not having the time or space to go into the history and sociology of it (which is fascinating), I want to talk about the effect our social attitudes around happiness can have on mental illness, particularly in our religious setting.

How many times have we all heard that happiness is a choice? And yes, of course there are times when it is a choice. Let’s be honest, there are times when we choose to be miserable—maybe because happiness scares us, maybe because somewhere along the way we learned that was a powerful way to get people’s attention, maybe because it’s a way of getting people to do what we want, maybe because we have poor emotional intelligence, maybe because life just really sucks right now and we don’t have the energy to pretend it doesn’t. And maybe because sometimes, in a weird topsy-turvy way, being miserable makes us feel good. It makes us feel like things aren’t our fault. And during those times we need the reminder that, while we may experience unhappiness, that doesn’t mean we have to be victims to it; that we really can change our attitudes.

But unhappiness is not always an attitude. There are times in life when it has nothing to do with our choices, our mindset, our actions, our faith. There are times when unhappiness is completely and totally outside of our control. There are times when we will even experience great unhappiness because we are like God, not in spite of it (for example, it is because we love that when we lose a loved one our very soul seems to break and bleed, a pain that could be avoided by not loving). Similarity, mental illness is not an attitude; not a normal phase of difficulty when we can just chin up and pull ourselves up by our boot straps. Having depression, BPD, OCD, schizophrenia, severe anxiety, etc. is not a choice. Sometimes this is a hard thing for us as members of the church to accept. The concept of agency is so deeply rooted in our perception of God it is almost impossible for us to conceptualize a world where agency doesn’t reign supreme. This concept of agency gives us an underlying assurance that God is fair, and judgement and mercy are straight forward. We so often talk about happiness as a reward for a life well-lived, as an evidentiary evaluation of our faith and life skills. And it causes us so, so much unhappiness.

The problem is when we see happiness as a measure, as opposed to an experience, it can become a weight around our neck—a sign of judgement, either for or against us. For the person with mental illness an additional weight can be placed upon them—the weight of the unhappiness of their loved ones. As someone who has both experienced and been a care taker for loved ones with severe mental illness I can attest to the brutality of this on both ends. It is agonizing to watch someone you love struggle with mental illness; to see them in such deep unhappiness. And it is so, so hard not to try and fix it; to perseveringly hold our desires for their happiness in front of them as motivation. And so often it serves as the constant reminder to them that not only are they unhappy, but they are causing unhappiness to others. And in the church, causing unhappiness to others is one of the worst things you can do to another person, often being associated with that awful word: selfish.

Ironically, the more people and societies focus on personal happiness, the less happy they are. I have no doubt but that we have all felt this at times, spiraling around being happy, wondering what it means that we aren’t, or being perhaps overly proud of what we think it means when we are. Worrying that it will be taken from us if we don’t keep being good enough to deserve it. But for individuals and societies that focus on meaning, the effects are different.

I think it’s important here to interject Mary’s Hot Take of what I do and do not mean when I’m talking about meaning. I do not mean that God made everything happen for a reason and we need to find what the reason is. I think this idea stems from the tragedy that as humans we’d rather believe in a God that who is cruel than a God who is not in complete control. The fact that, on any level, we could believe that a child being abused by a parent, a homeless teen being pushed to become addicted to drugs so she could be trafficked, a family fleeing violence only to be victimized, blamed, and exploited happens because God instigated it for some mysterious reason (usually because the victims deserved or needed it to teach them something) is deeply, deeply problematic. So, when I talk about meaning I am not talking about finding out why God caused this thing to happen.

Rather I am talking about meaning as an act of creation. The ability to create is in our DNA. Literally. As children of our God Mother and Father we are creators; not just laborers, but actual architects. I think this has everything to do with meaning. Meaning isn’t exclusively something that is set in stone, out there for us to discover as soon as we are righteous enough to see it. Some of the most important meanings of our life’s experiences are ones that we create with our Heavenly Parents. Not for one moment do I believe that a person experiences mental illness because God made that happen, any more than I believe God causes cancer or car accidents or natural disasters. These are things that happen because we live in a world where things collide and grate and die. So, what do I mean by meaning then? I mean what we decide to make of something; I mean the ways that we decide how we want to move through the world. How we want to relate to it; what matters to us and how we want to affect and be affected by the part of the world around us. We don’t always get to decide the pieces we have to create a life with, and we don’t always get to decide how those pieces get used in each instance. We don’t always get to decide how we act and feel and how others see us. As nice as it would be, we do not have complete agency over our lives.

I think meaning is what we decide to create with what we have, with both the freedoms and limitations of our personal building material. It means learning to let go of the measure of things and to look to the heart of them. For example, I know one young woman with debilitating and sometimes life-threatening depression who found art to be one of the only things that kept her alive, so she became an artist. She still has severe depressive bouts. She may for the rest of her life. But art serves as the reminder that there is beauty and interest in the world, and it is still there even in the times she can’t see it. She lives a quiet life and struggles to be around people very often, but art has helped her to be more curious about people and what is in them that she can’t see and it has helped her to be less negative in her beliefs about others. God did not make her have depression so that she could learn this; rather out of the depression something beautiful and important was created, and it was created according to her unique perspective. It wasn’t something God forced upon her for her own good, it was something God did with her. There are a lot of important things in life she can’t do, and there are wonderful things she can. Sometimes the things she can’t do overwhelm her, but there is always the reminder that, regardless of how much or little she “accomplishes” in this life, there are things in it that are worth holding on to; that even during the times she can’t see and experience them, they are still there, and she will be able to see them again. She has one of the most beautiful minds and hearts of anyone I have ever known. It is not fair she has to go through this. And as someone who knows and loves her, I thank God every day for what she has created in her art and herself. Without her having to accomplish anything else in life, the world is better because she is in it.

As care givers, we may need to recognize that there may be times when our desperate desire for the happiness of our loved one is actually hurting them. That our inability, perhaps unwillingness, to see and accept them for who they are in this moment out of some belief that would be “giving in” to their unhappiness and therefore somehow giving up on their happiness is driving them to greater despair. Whether or not we acknowledge mental illness will not affect whether or not a person experiences it, but it may affect their ability to carry it.

Happiness is not a measure. It is not always a choice. There may be times where the hopes of it need to be set aside, at least for a little while, while other more urgent needs are attended to. This is not failure. This is life. It hurts; it’s awful that it hurts and it’s ok that it hurts. Being unhappy isn’t a sign of having done something wrong; sometimes it just means you’re in pain, and it’s not your fault. Don’t carry the extra weight of guilt for not being happy or not being able to make someone you love happy. Just remember, when you can, it has nothing to do with your worth, or with whether or not your life has value. Because those things are, and forever are, untouchable. Those are yours no matter how you feel. And that means something.