Don’t Worry, Be Happy!
We get a lot of messaging in our culture about our thoughts, emotions, and general mental state.
The overarching message is: “If you don’t like the way you feel, you should do something to change it.”
Here’s how I interpret the eponymous line in the song Don’t Worry, Be Happy -
It’s bad to be worried. If you are worried, you should do something to be happy instead. Being happy is the key to living life the right way.
A few notes.
If it were that easy, we would just do it. There’s a reason it is so invalidating if someone says “just get over it” or “don’t let it bother you.” We can’t generate or change a feeling out of thin air. There might be times that we can do things that correlate to a better mood, but even that isn’t a guarantee (and can get exhausting/disruptive).
The use of “be” implies that emotions are a permanent way of being. But they’re actually transient. I am a human who feels emotions, those emotions change all the time, and sometimes I feel more than one emotion at the same time!
All of this conspires to put us in a dilemma.
Being worried is bad. I want to be happy.
BUT
I can’t directly get rid of my worry (ie, I can’t turn it off like I can turn a light off if it is too bright), and I can’t make myself be happy.
The harder I try to not worry and be happy, the more worried I get.
I help unwind this dilemma. The key lies in the response to the difficult emotion (worry). This is a skill that is simply not taught and is underdeveloped in nearly all of us. So a more workable reframe of the lyric might be -
I notice that I am feeling worried. I don’t like feeling this way, AND I recognize that it is my current experience whether I like it or not. How can I respond to my worry in a way that aligns with what is important to me? I cannot be sure that happiness will appear, AND I know that choosing to act in a way that is important to me allows my emotions the best opportunity to transform.
Maybe that’s not as catchy 😊 but I bet it’s more doable!