Arguing the rules of grammar...

At times, the English language and I have a little disagreement.  From having had a grandfather who invented his own words to growing up in the city of Pittsburgh, which has its own "Pittsburghese Dictionary", sometimes I get a little confused.

I also have to admit that sometimes, I just plain out disagree with the rules of grammar.  Today my gripe is about the word "happy".  According to the rules of grammar, happy is an adjective, a way that we describe a current state.  Ex: Maria looks happy.  Although this may be true, I feel that the English language gives everyone a pass to say that happiness is somehow out of our control.  It is something that we feel when the stars align for us in the right way.  This, my friends, is BS.

One of the powerful and also hard lessons I had to learn over my 30 years is that if you are waiting for happiness, get ready for one really, really long wait.  I truly believe that in order to obtain happiness, you have to make it into an action.

My brother-in-law recently shared a great book with me to kick off my new year.  It is called, "The Happiness Project" by Gretchen Rubin and if you haven't read it, go out and get yourself a copy.  Throughout the book, Rubin identifies ways in which she wants to be more proactive in obtaining happiness in her life.  She uses her current wisdom to formulate her "Secrets of Adulthood," which consists of advice she's learned like always bring a sweater and other people don't notice your mistakes as much as you do.  She then targets her "12 Commandments".  These include twelve different individualized themes that she works on throughout the year. Each month is a theme and each theme has its own set of individualized goals.  Ex: In her marriage theme, one of her goals is to stop nagging her husband.  She chronicles her experiences throughout the year and she tweeks the goals that contradict her Secrets to Adulthood.  I won't say anymore other than her transformation will leave you thinking about ways in which you can start your own Happiness Project.

You know as well as I, that life has an interesting way of throwing us curve balls.  No one stands at the top of the mountain forever, even though sometimes jealousy can cause us to think this.  Even if you have lead a seemingly status quo existence, one day your are bound to trip and when you do, I hope that you chose to disagree with the English language as well.  Go out there today and make happiness a verb!