Why Do I Feel Guilty For Feeling Happy To Be Alive?

Sometimes, I have this weird sense that I shouldn't feel happy, even though I am. Everyone around me seems to be depressed about something or the other, upset, irritated, or angry about everything. But I feel happy. Life isn't perfect, but I feel grateful to be alive. This guilt eats into my happiness, though, which is unfortunate.

Photo by benti kaur on Unsplash

Transcript

Hello everyone!

I hope that you're doing amazing where we are in the world.

My name is Bhoomshakha and I welcome you to my channel.

As always,

I'm so grateful that you're listening,

Subscribing and commenting.

I really appreciate the support.

In this one,

I wanted to speak to you about a question that someone asked recently.

And the reason,

I mean they asked it not recently but a while back.

The reason I wasn't able to do a video on it is because it was a very complicated question and I had to think about it a bit.

I don't even think I have the right answer or the perfect answer for it yet.

But I really wanted to share my thoughts on it now.

And so hopefully you guys will forgive me if it's not a complete answer.

But I wanted to share some of my thoughts on it.

The question is,

I wonder if you could maybe talk about the struggle of wanting to enjoy this world so much because of the whole obsession with death and being here a limited time.

But also being afraid of being ourselves when there's people around that we don't know that well.

It's such a brilliant question,

Right?

Because I mean,

Of course we are,

We should try to enjoy this world as much as possible because we are here for a limited time.

We're here for a very limited time.

You imagine that a hundred years,

If you live for a hundred years,

Even most people don't,

If you live for sixty years,

Forty years or eighty years,

Whatever that number might be for you,

Who knows what it is.

Even if you imagine that you live for that long,

It's still a very short period of time if you think about it.

Yes,

Each moment sometimes feels very long and each day feels like it's dragging on forever.

And especially in the pandemic,

A lot of you say that it feels like you've been living these few months for years now.

But even then,

Before you know it,

It's all going to be over.

And you're going to be sitting there,

Your deathbed,

Thinking,

Hmm,

Did I live my life the way I wanted to?

And in a lot of cases,

Unfortunately,

The answer is a resounding no,

I did not.

I have lots of regrets.

Unfortunately,

A lot of people have regrets when they are on their deathbed.

So there is this idea,

Of course,

Of wanting to extremely,

Extremely enjoy the world because you are here for a limited time,

But not even the limited time in a way that you're aware of how limited it is.

You know,

That's the problem here is that,

You know,

You might die tomorrow and you don't know,

Or you might die in fifty years.

You have no idea.

So that in itself also creates the struggle of really wanting to enjoy this world right now in this moment in time,

Because who knows when you'll die.

You could be dead tomorrow or you might die the next hour,

Right?

Or you'll have lots of time left,

But we don't know.

The problem,

Obviously,

As she said,

Is that,

You know,

You want to enjoy the world and be really,

Really extremely happy,

Despite of what's going on in the world.

There is a lot of terrible things going on in the world.

Yes,

Of course.

But you are alive right now and lots of people aren't.

You know,

Lots of people do not get to be alive right now.

Lots of people did die because of the coronavirus.

No matter if you think it's a hoax or not.

I know a lot of you have messaged me saying you think it's a hoax.

Either way,

People are dying.

And so you're still alive.

You're still here.

Right?

Despite all the negative stuff happening in the world,

There is this,

There should be this incessant desire within us to enjoy every moment to the max,

Because it's going to end soon.

And it's not like it might end soon.

Or,

Yeah,

No,

Maybe in land,

Maybe I'll live forever.

No,

You're not going to live forever.

No one is until they do something about it in the future.

Right now,

In this moment in time,

No one is going to live forever.

The max you're going to live is 100 years,

110.

I think the oldest person was 130.

But I don't know if that was actually real or not.

Either way,

There's a limited amount of time that you have left and becoming more and more limited as the seconds stick by.

You know,

One less second now,

One less second now,

One less second now.

And so not that I'm telling you to think of it that way.

But of course,

Remember that you have a limited amount of time and you are here.

You're alive in this moment in time.

And you're lucky to be alive in this moment in time.

Millions of people have died already,

Not just in the coronavirus and not just because of whatever,

But hundreds of millions of people have died in the past.

They're not here right now unless they've been reincarnated.

But you don't know that.

And hundreds of millions of people are going to die in the future.

But you're here right now in this moment in time.

You're here.

You're alive.

So let's enjoy it.

But then she said something about,

I think it was a she or he,

The person said something about not wanting to show off to other people that you're enjoying your life.

I think that's basically the idea of it,

Because you're afraid to be yourself,

Afraid to show the world that you're happy.

And this comes up a lot to me,

For me at least,

Because as I said,

There's a lot of negative stuff happening in the world.

But I'm a pretty positive person in general.

Yes,

Of course,

I have moments where I'm like,

Oh my God,

I hate people.

You know,

I'll read some random news story and I'll be like,

You know what?

I really don't like people.

And I'll really get into this funk where I'll be like,

I hate humanity.

I hate people.

And I hate this world.

And how dare they?

And how dare they do this?

And people are terrible.

And,

You know,

Things like that.

Of course,

I get into those funks.

But in general,

I love the world.

I love my life.

I love the fact that we are alive,

That we have this opportunity to have these experiences,

To learn from them,

To grow from them.

And eventually,

As I said,

It'll all be over.

But at least right now in this moment in time,

I'm here.

I'm alive.

I'm lucky.

And so,

As I said,

It was this thing that I had within me where in the past I would be afraid to show my happiness to people because I would think that they would judge me.

And in a lot of cases,

They do judge me.

In a lot of cases,

People will message me saying,

You know,

Why are you smiling?

Do you know what's going on in the world?

Or,

You know,

Why are you so happy?

Why are you so cheerful and bubbly?

Do you know what's happening in the world right now?

There's terrible things happening in the world.

People are terrible.

There's evil in the world.

How dare you be happy?

Right.

And so,

Of course,

That does come up for me as well.

And,

You know,

It does come up for me when I'm some of my friends as well,

Because they're going through a difficult time,

Perhaps,

Or they're depressed or,

You know,

They're not able to be happy.

And I am.

And of course,

There is this kind of negative pressure on me to say to be unhappy.

There's always a negative pressure on all of us to be unhappy.

I think that's how the world wants us to be.

Not only in the consumeristic world,

Of course,

But the media wants us to be unhappy because then we'll buy things.

The capitalistic society wants us to be unhappy.

So again,

We'll buy things and produce profit for the world and grow the economy.

Other people want us to be unhappy because they're unhappy.

So they want you to join them and be miserable together.

Right.

Misery loves company.

And so all of the things around you,

Everything around you is pressuring you in a negative manner to be unhappy.

And this is something that is just innate in our society right now.

It's very common.

If you notice it and if you kind of pay attention to it,

If you observe it,

It's very,

Very,

Very apparent that there's very few pressures in the world allowing you to be happy or wanting to you to be happy.

There's actually,

I would say,

95 percent of the ideas in the world and the societal tenets in the world.

All of that stuff is wanting,

Wants us to be unhappy because,

As I said,

Unhappy people buy more things.

Unhappy people consume more.

Unhappy people will watch more TV.

Unhappy people will eat more crappy food and get sick more often and again create more for the economy.

So unhappy people are more lucrative for the world in general.

And so in general,

The world wants us to be unhappy.

It is just the way it is.

Right.

And if you don't believe me,

Of course,

You don't have to.

But you can go online and look at all the different things going on in the world.

There's more negative news in the world and positive.

And there's also a lot of negative,

More negative things happening in the world,

Apparently,

Than positive things.

And if you do focus on the positive,

People get angry with you.

This happens to me all the time.

As I said,

People will always constantly be messaging me saying things like,

You know,

You shouldn't be so happy.

You know,

You're lucky.

Yes,

Of course,

You have a good life.

But,

You know,

There's things happening in the world that you should be sad about.

You should be sad all the time.

There's this is no time to be happy and things like that.

You know,

People are always messaging me,

Things like that.

And as I said,

There's a general pressure in the world,

Not only from our peer group,

But from our family,

Relatives,

Acquaintances,

Friends,

Society,

Media.

Anything,

Everything is always telling us to be unhappy,

Wanting us to be unhappy.

As I said,

Unhappy people are more lucrative.

They consume more.

They create more profits for the world in general.

And so in general,

The movement is towards unhappiness.

So if you are going against the tide,

If you are moving against the flow of traffic,

Of course,

That's a negative thing.

Right.

I mean,

People are all moving towards unhappiness and all moving towards more consumption and all moving towards more of that.

And you're like,

No,

I don't think I want to go that way.

I think I'm going to go the opposite way.

And so you go towards the opposite direction.

You go in the opposite direction,

You move towards the happiness zone where it's very,

Very low.

It's like no one there is very few people there.

And,

You know,

Everyone's like,

What are you doing?

Why are you doing that?

Why are you moving against the tide?

You should go along with us,

You know.

And there's a lot of pressure,

A lot of pulling,

A lot of basically tugging at you to go into the unhappiness zone and very little pressure or pull towards you to go towards the happiness zone.

Right.

And so,

Again,

As I said,

There is a lot of pressure on us to be unhappy,

But not a lot of pressure to be happy.

Are people telling?

Yes,

They're pretending like they're selling you things that will make you happy,

Of course.

But it's not really like that.

Right.

It's not really like that.

They're just trying to sell you things.

And so this is our rebellion,

Rebellion nature against the world.

You have to be the rebel here.

You have to realize that it doesn't matter what everyone else thinks.

It doesn't matter what society thinks.

Of course,

They want you to be unhappy.

Of course,

Everyone else around you is miserable.

So they want you to be miserable.

Being the only happy person in the family filled with unhappy people is very hard.

I can tell you that.

But you have to be and I know this is a very overused term,

But you have to be the light in the world.

You have to be the positive person in the world,

Because if you are happy,

Then just show it.

It's fine.

Yes,

People are going to be angry about it.

Of course.

Yes,

People are going to hate you for it.

Of course.

Yes,

They're going to be like,

What is wrong with this person?

How dare she?

Does she know what's going on in the world?

Of course.

But is it more important for you to please people around you and to go along with the crowd or to push against the crowd and actually live your happy life?

If you want to be happy and joyful for the fact that you're here,

You're alive.

For God's sake,

You're alive.

I mean,

Come on.

Yes,

Of course,

Terrible things are going on in the world,

But we're alive in this moment in time.

What a beautiful gift to have this joy of being alive.

And so for me,

I've given up on pleasing other people and going along with their tenant about being unhappy.

I gave up on that.

I'm not going to do it anymore.

I refuse to go along with it.

I've gone along with it for long enough.

I don't want to do it anymore.

I'm 37 almost already in August,

And I have maybe a few years left,

10,

15,

20,

30 more years left.

Who knows?

And I'm not going to go along with it anymore.

I'm going to enjoy these last 15,

20,

30 years as much as I can.

I'm going to be happy despite what's going on in the world.

Doesn't mean I'm going to ignore what's going on in the world.

I'm going to obviously talk about it and fight for it.

But I'm still going to be happy for the fact that I'm here.

I'm alive,

God.

For God's sake,

I'm alive.

Thank you,

Bhagwan.

I mean,

Bhagwan is an Indian word for God.

Thank you,

God.

I'm alive.

Thank you,

Universe.

I'm alive.

Thank you for this gift.

I'm so grateful.

And I'm just going to keep on going that way.

So I hope I answered your question.

I know I've been in the same situation as you,

So I do empathize with you.

But it's more important for you to be happy to be alive than to go along with people who are miserable.

I really do think it's the most important thing you could do in your life right now.

Again,

If you think I've answered your question,

Let me know.

If I haven't,

Then,

Of course,

Let me know as well.

And I'll try to expand on it further,

Of course.

Again,

Thank you for asking such a brilliant question.

I really do appreciate these questions.

They make me think.

I'm sitting there pondering and thinking and reflecting on it.

So I love it.

It makes me happy.

Again,

Thank you for listening,

For subscribing,

For being on my channel.

I appreciate you guys and I shall see you the next time around.

Bye for now!

Reviews

Yes. Even in grief there is room for joy.