What Makes You Unhappy?

Did you ever stop to think just what it is that makes you unhappy?

You wake up in the morning and it is raining. You watch the water running in the street and the raindrops dripping from the leaves. Wonderful, you say. This is a good day to read your book. But suppose this was the day you had planned to go on a picnic or to the ball game. Gloom and disappointment.

Or maybe you are running an errand for your mother. You are enjoying the walk and it is a beautiful day. But a friend passes you riding a brand-new bike. You begin to wonder why you can't have a nice bike like that, and suddenly you get tired of walking.

You think you have a pretty nice home to live in until you see Sandra's home. It is a mansion compared with yours. Then you begin to see that your carpets are worn. the draperies are faded, and the furniture is old-fashioned. You are ashamed to bring your friends into your house.

We become unhappy over things that we do not have when we see others having them. We are usually content with what we have until we see what others have. Then we get filled with envy and wonder why we cannot enjoy some of those things, too. Envy and jealousy eat at us like a worm eating the leaves on our plants. We have to learn how to fight envy and jealousy.

Someone wrote: "So long as there is air in our lungs we will not sink. So long as we are thankful to God we can stay on top." Envy is selfishness, and it means that we are not thankful to God for what we already have. If we fill our hearts with thankfulness for what we have we shall not have time to miss what we do not have.