Happiness

Whenever I log on to gaydar, the web site always presents me with a list of the guys who I've bookmarked that are currently online. There are two categories of bookmarks, namely 'friends' or 'favourites', although for a long time gaydar user like me the distinction has become a bit blurred. Some guys in my 'favourites' category are definitely more friends (or boyfriends!) these days, and some guys in my 'friends' I hardly know!

A good example of a guy who's in my 'friends' category, who in all honestly I hardly know, is the guy D who lives in New York. Although I haven't been in contact with him for over two years, he still logs on to gaydar occasionally, so sometimes I log on and spot that he's logged in too. I never contact him though, because there doesn't seem to be any reason to get in touch. But I always enjoy remembering the happy week when we met, keeping each other's company in the evenings and cuddling up at night.

At one point last weekend, I spotted that D was logged in when I logged in, but for some reason I went further than I usually do and actually clicked on his icon to bring up his profile. I was hoping that it would give me a clue as to how he's getting on these days, and what he's up to. But instead, there was a poem on his profile which really struck a cord with me. Although it was a long poem, there was a simple punchline: "Happiness is a journey, not a destination".

I think this is very true. One shouldn't plan to be happy in the future because that won't work, instead happiness comes from enjoying the things that we do every day. This insight is probably compatible with Bhutan's concept of Gross National Happiness, because Gross National Happiness is about quality of life and that relates to what people experience every day.

In any case, I decided to make a list of the things that make me happy. I don't know if this is already a bloggers meme, but if not, I reckon it's a good candidate to become one :-). What I've done below is to list, in descending order of enjoyment, the ten things that make me feel happiest.

So here we go, starting with the thing that makes me feel the happiest, my list is as follows:

• Cuddling up and falling asleep with another guy (without sexual activity), especially when he's a boyfriend. I've said it before, but I always sleep badly if I have to sleep on my own!


• Socialising, especially with friends. However, the greatest happiness of this type is catching up with really old friends that I haven't seen for years.


• Sexual activities with boyfriends :-).


• Creativity and achievement. Either at work, which might mean a good solution to a client's problem, or at play, such as writing a good post for this blog.


• A good story that stirs my emotions, whether it's a book, a film or a theatre play.


• Recognition from others for one's creativity and achievements :-).


• Holidays and travelling to new places.


• Wine. Sharing a good bottle with friends, or collecting good bottles to share with friends in the future.


• Invigorating gym workouts.


• Cruising and sexual activities with new guys, or guys who're not (yet?) boyfriends. This definitely makes me feel happy when I end up meeting a nice guy, but of course for every prince that one finds one has had to kiss a few frogs along the way, which is why this is bottom of the list!

Does anyone can else want to play?

Update 3-Jan-2008: I did a post today about "having sex" versus "making love". One of the things I've realised is that the above list should talk about making love, not sexual activities!