{"id":12585,"date":"2012-04-22T06:00:58","date_gmt":"2012-04-22T10:00:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sweetshoppedesigns.com\/?p=12585"},"modified":"2012-04-18T00:08:23","modified_gmt":"2012-04-18T04:08:23","slug":"just-look","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sweetshoppedesigns.com\/index.php\/2012\/04\/just-look\/","title":{"rendered":"Just Look!"},"content":{"rendered":"

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I will never forget the day. I was in high school and my boyfriend (actually, maybe an ex-boyfriend by then) was standing in my basement. \u00a0We were near a bookcase and he said to me, “You are bound and determined to be unhappy.”<\/p>\n

Around the same time I walked into my room only to see a book that my mom had laid on my bed. \u00a0It’s title? Happiness is a Choice.<\/em><\/p>\n

A few years later, my mom presented a\u00a0birthday\u00a0gift to me. \u00a0It was a poster collage of nature photos. \u00a0She called it my happy poster. \u00a0Her hope was that I would look at it and feel happy.<\/p>\n

The problem was, I wasn’t happy. \u00a0I was miserable. \u00a0I spent many, many years depressed and this depression led to counseling, medication, drug and alcohol abuse, and suicidal fascination.<\/p>\n

Oh how life has changed! I thought that there was no way out of my misery and I would have never believed that I would someday say that I was genuinely, truly, undeniably happy. \u00a0But I can say those things now. \u00a0Today. \u00a0I am happy<\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n

The thing is, life isn’t easy. \u00a0Life isn’t perfect.<\/p>\n