Prior to 7/23/08 Part 1 - Frameworks and Ephinanies

There are some things you will need to know before I start talking about my trip to the Arctic, things that will help frame what you are about to read.

I'm still fairly young, financially secure, I have a family, wife, kids, nice house, I even enjoy my work.

But I'm not happy.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not a downer either. I mean, to the outside, I'm a regular and charming guy, but behind that wall, when you strip away the persona that I radiate outwards to the world, what's left is the real me.. and the real me is saying, "You've attained all that you set out to do, why then aren't you satisfied? Why aren't you happy?"

So I made this list in my head.. this list of things that made me happy and things that didn't. But the process was a bit clunky and I wasn't sure why.

Then I read this NY Times article on The Futile Pursuit of Happiness, which basically says people mislead themselves into believing that getting or doing x will bring them happiness, when in reality, it doesn't bring nearly as much happiness as they thought it would and said happiness lasts for a far less amount of time.

The article rang true for me. Every car I've purchased went quickly from enthusiasm of a kid at Christmas to where's the next gift to open. In fact, every THING I have acquired really had this emptiness to it once I got it. Things didn't bring me happiness. I want a Porsche, but I know really really deep down, its not going to increase my happiness one bit.

So I started to look at things from another set of words, I went from sorting my life into happy/unhappy to content/not content.

This was a big epiphany. I don't think we as humans can ever be happy. Unless you are on some serious medication, no one wakes up happy in the morning and has even one day when everything just goes so freaking well that they sail through with a big smile on their face right up to the point where that grin hits the pillow at night. Life is full of ups and downs, a major component of life is struggle. Asking for persistent happiness is asking too much.

However, within our lives there are times each day predictable moments of contentment. Those moments may make you FEEL happy, but you ARE content. An example for me is seeing my two boys asleep in their beds. Every night that I go through my 'lock up the house' ritual and peek in, this warm feeling comes over me and for that moment, I am content.

Of course, the opposite is true as well. There are moments each day that are just chaos. Nothing about these moments are smooth, they are jagged, disorienting, harsh, stressful as stepping on shards of glass.

I separated my life into these two piles, with everything in between being just the day to day that we all deal with in life. It was either contentment or chaos. When I was done sorting, I found myself with the biggest problem I've ever had in my life..

You see, most of my moments of contentment revolved around my children. I'll give you one guess what brought most of my chaos..

Introduction

I went to the Arctic recently and had written up my travels in a journal. This is a formal dictation of that account.

Honestly, I am hiding my thoughts - which will get fairly personal - right out here on the internet, as this isn't just an oberservation of what animals and plants and rocks I saw. Given what I know of the web and it's vastness and the amount of crap (such as blogs) out there, it is kind of intriquing to me to share my thoughts knowing that maybe only 5 people will randomly stumble upon this.

For those that do, I promise a good read.

Rules: I am nameless, though my actions are such that anyone close to the events I'm about to tell can easily figure out who I am. Other rules: names will be changed, no fiction and no holding back how I really feel. Yikes.