I used to think I was the best judge of what would make me happy. That changed one auspicious day. All at once, my trusted car of 20 years died on an old country road, our tireless family computer gave up its friendly ghost, and a local vet sadly announced that our dream cat—Serenity—had just used up his ninth life after two decades of devotion to us. How my heart ached!

What would life be like without these dear and familiar entities? So much of our family history and vitality revolved around them. And how could I ever again be joyful when I had lost what I loved most about my life—control and predictability?

What appeared straightforward on the surface had deeper implications for me: the deaths of the car, the cat, and the computer put me in a crisis over my own aging and how I had not already worked out what makes me truly happy. If it was so important that I stay in control of my life, how could I face the ultimate loss of control—my own aging and death?

I reflected on my losses. So much of my current life’s joy had been predicated on setting goals for myself, working hard toward them, and attaining success through the things I could completely manage. Indeed, my success gave me much pleasure, thanks to abundant support and love from family, friends, and mentors. However, what came to me after that fateful day was that the joy of accomplishment—in getting what we want out of life—is only a limited happiness. God was asking me to find a much greater joy by looking for bliss in a different way.

So many of us expect to be satisfied by getting what we want out of life. We have come to expect, if not demand, personal gratification by doing all the right things and making all the right choices. We’re supposed to go to the best schools, marry the right people, live on the correct side of town, and at least pretend to be doing what we ought to be doing. After all, if we’re doing all the right things and getting what we want, shouldn’t we be happy?

Unfortunately, life doesn’t always happen the way it should happen, and we aren’t always happy even when we do get what we want. The reason we’re disenchanted is that we haven’t learned to be pleased when things don’t go our way. We haven’t learned to find joy in not being in control. Ironically, the majority of the world rarely gets what it wants.

Spiritual awakenings

“God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change” is a prayer that few of us truly grasp. So many of us grow up with the misguided idea that we ought to be in total control of our destinies, especially if we do all the right things. We expect that if adversity comes into our lives, we could have prevented it, that we are bad people for having it, and that there is nothing to be gained from it. We presume that we are all-knowing about what’s good for us, and that bad things only happen to the other guy. Well, are we in for some surprises!

Imagine our shock when we are told we have cancer, that our parents have been killed by a drunk driver in a fateful car accident, or that our beloved adult children would rather not spend time with us after we’ve devoted our entire lives to their welfare. These are only a few of the surprises life may have in store for us.

What’s most surprising is that we’re surprised in the first place. In fact, getting what we don’t want out of life is largely what real life is all about. These are spiritual awakenings. That fateful day on which I lost my beloved possessions was a day I’ll never forget.

Living in a culture of control and self-gratification

So many of us blame ourselves for suffering and have unrealistic expectations about avoiding it because we live in a culture that sees suffering as a defect of character rather than as a fact of life or an opportunity for spiritual transformation. Instead we are told we can reach for Advil if we want to control the pain, that real happiness is only a few miles ahead on the freeway to the casino, that our social phobias disappear with Paxil, and that even real men use Viagra. No mention is made of why we are stressed, whether true happiness endures after the casino, why we are embarrassed in public, or have erectile dysfunction. No mention is made that we might be better off simply living with our symptoms and learning from them.

Could it be that these so-called cures are really ways we are cutting ourselves off from a deeper appreciation of our own humanity? Could it be that others profit from our cultural conformity? Too many of us have given up on personal fulfillment and settled for short-term relief from our human dilemmas because we’ve bought into and been betrayed by these cultural prescriptions for happiness.

What if we decided to face our fears, live with our uncertainty, seek wisdom in our pain, accept our essential goodness in adversity, and allow pleasure to find us when it is ready to find us? What if we regularly shared our souls with friends, cultivated community in our daily lives, made amends to those whom we’ve hurt, prayed to a Higher Power, and gave up our grudges toward those who’ve harmed us? We would be going against the grain of our culture, and we would be opening ourselves to greater gifts.

The gift of adversity

While it’s unwise to pursue pain for its own sake, and there’s much to be lost by avoiding life’s ordinary pleasures, the benefits of human suffering in accepting adversity are often underrated. So many of us, in leading the good life, have not learned how to suffer well.

Dostoevsky, in his epic novel Crime and Punishment, advocated suffering as a healing process. His protagonist, Raskolnikov, underwent an extended period of agony and banishment for a horrendous crime he committed, only to find redemption and true love.

Sometimes adversity deepens our character and gives us hope in ways that we would never have found without it. Becoming more palpably aware of those who really love us, how abundant human compassion can be, and how terribly resilient and creative we are in surviving hardship are only a few of the profound rewards of accepting adversity. If we see the bad things that happen to us as being lessons we’ve not yet learned, we will be free of self-pity and richly rewarded beyond our greatest expectations.

The joy of surrender

It’s hard to put into words the pleasure that comes from surrendering to human suffering. I can only speak for myself. Living with one less car and walking more, leaping off of my familiar family screen and onto the internet with a laptop, and being less scared of funerals after Serenity’s memorial service have made me a better person. Not only am I happy, I am fearlessly happy.