The Unbearable Impossibleness of Smiling

Gah. Happiness is an elusive old chap, what?

By rights I ought to be happy. For months - no, years - I've been bemoaning my lack of spare time and wishing I could just find time for this and that and the other. Tidying, sorting, organising, relaxing, spending time with loved ones. Now I can do all that and more, but am I happy? Am I bollocks.

Of course there is the small matter of having no job or income in the midst of a global recession and having been told I was rubbish at what I was trying to do with my life... but I'm managing fine financially for the time being, and I'm pretty confident I'll get a job soon, and the job application process has actually done wonders for mny career-based confidence, as I've had three interviews from four applications and two of them went really well and I very-nearly got jobs out of them, and they were for good employers. Which is why the number of applications is so low - I'm being very picky about what I apply for, on the basis that I don't want to end up back in the same hole I've just clawed my way out of.

The Things That Make Me Happy, however, are frustratingly complex. I need exercise, I need human company, I need positive feedback, I need to feel productive, and I need time to relax (but not too much of it).

My worst problem is decision-making. Not only can I not decide what to do from one minute to the next, I can't stick with those decisions once they're made. "Tomorrow I will read a book," I say gaily, only to find mnyself durfing the net. "Tomorrow I will sort out my finances," I quip. And then I read a book. I plan to get exercise and sort my finances out instead. They are all good things to be doing (well, maybe not the surfing the net bit), but I can't allow myself to feel good about doing them.

I either feel depressed because I haven't been productive or anxious because I might be called upon to do temping work in an alien environment or - and this is the most ridiculous of all - guilty because I'm finally managing to enjoy myself and I'm supposed to be jobless and miserable!

Pah.

Oh well. Today I will mostly be... faffing. fretting. fidgeting. failing?

No! No failing!

Oh. All right then.