The complexity of simplicity

As tensions run high and finals loom on the horizon, some students will begin to reach their breaking point. Allow me to speak of something many of us find deeply paradoxically frustrating, but may not quite have the words for: that is how unsatisfying simple answers are. Still, I believe it may be helpful, in its own way, for us to be fully aware of its simplistic nature. 

The truth of the matter is this: the key to happiness, the fountain of joy, the secret ingredient to the perfect life, is vexingly simple. This is a harrowingly complex fact to accept.

Anyone that has invested their time and effort into consuming and following the directions of self-help books or YouTube videos that promise to cease procrastination — allegedly granting their consumers with the confidence and power to commit to an effective lifestyle — will be able to attest to this. Thing is, these tutorials and fabled paths to contentment are nothing more than structure to an otherwise painfully obvious and strangely heartbreaking reply to all and every single one of our questions. They may provide a methodology and further detail, but the fundamental knowledge is already embedded into all of us.

If you merely want your instinct reinstated once more, I can write it out for you. Though, you don’t need me to tell you any of the following. 

The key to happiness is to do all of the following per day (within reason and absent extreme circumstances): 

1. Exercise. This is the top factor, easily. Move, jump, scream! Get your heartbeat up for at least 30 minutes, it doesn't matter when or how. Ignore the delusional body standards and the hyper-specific metrics. Ignore everyone and everything beyond what is most helpful for you and you alone. Have fun with it!
2. Sleep as much as your body needs, and then a little more. 7-8 hours in a set pattern is the official recommendation, but the truth is you simply have to know and follow your sleep cycles and nap appropriately. Listen to your body for additional information.
3. Eat healthy. Have a balanced diet near your maintenance level that avoids processed foods, though not at the cost of your joy. Yes, eat your veggies and your fruits, but allow yourself to eat your burgers and fries too if you feel like it. Simply balance it back somehow at the end of the day. If you also achieve item one, you’re halfway there.
4. Dream, and then, do it. Every day, work towards something — anything. It can be big or it can be small. Seek a desire to build towards and don’t let go.
5. Find a way to approximate all of the above. No one actually gets to do everything on this list properly every day. We are not robots and we shouldn’t restrict ourselves to pure routine nor expect perfection. Give yourself the reasonable leeway you need and make it sustainable. 
6. Lastly, be kind to yourself, to others and to the world around you. Learn to care. Learn to hurt. Learn to cry. Learn that life has meaning and it need not make sense. Learn to value the people around you and learn to say “I love you.” Learn that there are sad days and there are bad people too but neither of these are reasons to stop being kind. 
7. And as a bonus, to go beyond, connect with the world. Become aware of where you are and live it. Remember: the sun in your eyes, the wind in your hair, a child’s laugh, a bird’s chirp, an all-nighter, a scrape on the knee, your friend’s embrace and your goodnight farewells. Take a good deep breath. Sense it, feel it and find the beauty in it all. 

That’s all there is: seven items. You can delve further into every mechanism but the ideas themselves are simple. Healthy body, healthy mind. Healthy mind, healthy body. These lead to good relationships and self-realization. Truly, there are not that many components to keep track of. To be happy, on paper, is simple.

Yet if that is so, why is it that so many struggle? How come so many fail?

When it comes to the mental health crisis confronting this country — particularly my generation, but perhaps the entirety of humanity as well — many of us find ourselves at a loss. It is not merely a matter of isolation, but a desperate search for a hidden cheat code in the fabric of existence, a true final step to acquire so it all magically clicks and we become happy. Social media has made this idea seem very accessible, with all the flashiest, most successful people readily available to display wealths of motivational speeches and share secret techniques to prevail and prosper.

But, when it comes to what we genuinely seek, there is no classified information; that strikes at the core of our being.

We don’t like simple things. We tend to dislike thinking of ourselves as simple creatures.

Our egos personify everything, our brains claim the title of the greatest storytellers and we engulf ourselves in the most minuscule details. And while that is fun, it may not always be true. We love to gossip of the possibilities, adore drowning in the fictions and the superfluous. We engage in such imaginations because doing so grants justification.

We want the answer to happiness to be complex. We want some secret formula, something we must have missed, something that goes beyond our capabilities, because if not, what does that say of us? If it is so obvious and so easy, why is it that its spark is so fleeting? 

We need it to be a complicated, difficult feat to be happy — a long journey with trials and tribulations. Otherwise, it is our fault. Otherwise, we are not enough. Otherwise, why are we the way we are?

But this train of thought is the fallacious result of believing a commitment to simplicity to be simple. To accept simplicity for what it is and live in it is where the complexity lies. 

In other words: To be happy is easy. To be happy with being simply happy is hard. It is against our very nature.

Genuine contentment is counterintuitive for we must exit our storytelling carousel, permit ourselves to be simple and come face-to-face with the fact that there is nothing more to uncover. There are no missing parts of this puzzle. You already have all the tools to achieve that which you desire, all you have to do is cease your fictions and bring it forth into reality. It’s that simple. 

How complex.