Adagia

"Happiness is an acquisition."

It's funny how this is the first one, because this is an idea that has shaped me as a person and has vastly improved my life. When I opened "the bible" and saw this, I had one of those great moments where my breath was taking away, and I just wanted to shout, "Yes!"

My definition of success is happiness. You must be happy in whatever you are doing, whatever it is. However, happiness doesn't just happen. It grows. You learn to be happy. You make the choice. I mean, of course you're not always going to be happy, and there will always be something that happens that will take your happiness away. However, it is fleeting. You will be happy again if you really want to be. And what is true happiness if you have never experienced pain? Looking at it from a Lucretius perspective, everything is dust. We are dust. Things that happen to us are dust. Emotions are dust. They will all blow away eventually. You must learn to be happy. You must find enough strength in your happiness to allow it to continue on even when the world seems determined to take it away. Happiness is an acquisition.

I have friends who are waiting for happiness to find them. They don't understand that they must acquire it themselves. Happiness doesn't just come. They don't understand why they are not happy. They sit in their rooms watching TV, complaining about their jobs, their lives. They think happiness will just come, and become frustrated and angry when it doesn't, which pushes them deeper into depression. Until they understand that they must go pursue this happiness, they will never acquire it.

I have other friends who live under this mindset of happiness acquisition. They have experienced sadness, experienced depression and became tired of it. They were tired of waiting. They knew what they needed to do in order to be happy, and they did it. And now nothing can take that happiness away. Of course, they are not perpetually happy now. They have their times, they slip back into depression, they become sad and angry and frustrated. However, now that they have acquired true happiness, they know that the bad times are fleeting, and the happiness will return. They know the steps they need to take to acquire happiness. They have the control and nothing can take that away. They have acquired happiness.

"A poem is a meteor."

This one caught my eye because I had to think about it for quite some time. How is a poem like a meteor? Once I realized, I thought that this was the most beautiful idea. When good poetry is first read, it is beautiful, at least to me. The words rush over me, and I get lost in the wonder of it, much like a meteor; when it comes to Earth, it begins as a shooting star, beautiful in the night sky. It takes your breath away as you watch it move across the night sky.

But then, I read the poem more. I try to find its meaning. I take it piece by piece, determining what exactly the author meant. And then it hits me, and the impact makes a mark that will never be erased. It is not gentle as it hits, more like an explosion. Like a meteor. The soft beauty of the shooting star hits the Earth, creating a crater (depending on the size of the meteor, of course). This, too, is a lot like poetry. Good poems may make a small indent, but great poems create a giant crater, changing the world forever. Maybe one day I might come across a poem big enough to turn my entire world upside down, changing everything I ever knew.