100 Happy Days Challenge

I've done it, 100, ahem, consecutive happy days.  So how did it go? Well I'm glad you asked cos it went a little something like this...

The Challenge

Every day submit a picture of what made you happy!  

It can be anything from a meet-up with a friend to a very tasty cake in the nearby coffee place, from a feeling of being at home after a hard day to a favour you did to a stranger.  

#100happyday challenge is for you - not for anyone else. 

It is not a happiness competition or a showing off contest. If you try to please / make others jealous via your pictures - you lose without even starting. 

A particularly worthwhile Happy Day - if you want to donate too go to: http://makingadifference.gofundraise.com.au/page/shinealight

The Issues

Strangely the one issue reported to cause most people to fail (time) wasn't a problem. My main issue was having the attention span of a gnat so I frequently forgot which day I was meant to be on.  Sometimes I'd report day 66 twice or jump from day 67 to 69 or forget a whole day.  I soon decided that I didn't really give a toss about that though, as I was enjoying myself too much.  It's a proper lovely thing to find out that, give or take the odd day, I am pretty happy on a regular basis.  I also got a closer look at the things in my life that made me smile and most of my images revolved around the four F's Friends; Food; Flowers; Fashion.

Sometimes it was something a bit more frivolous that made me happy

The Outcome
The outcome was I found I could concentrate on the positives in the day even if I'd had a really crappy one.  For example on a particularly bad day on the slopes (I can feel this may not be the best place to start but stay with me) I fell over 17 times on one run.  This was in February and the bruises are still visible, that day was beyond frustrating and more than a tad painful!  As I had just started 100 Happy Days I didn't want to give up so looked around for something nice to photograph.  Which is when I saw the view (I know I know, trust me it's more difficult to pick out if you're tumbling down multiple times!).  I focused on how bloody lucky I am to be there at all! I'd like to say this made me a better skier but alas, it had no effect on my physical performance.  I cried less after that though! 

Sometimes it was a beautiful sunset

These past few months have also seen me fall out with a friend I've had (or not if you were to believe her) for coming up to 15 years.  There were days when I was getting slammed in long rambling text messages and being spoken to like the worst person to set foot on the planet.  If I hadn't been doing 100 Happy Days I might not have been able to realise the negatives that were hurled at me weren't really about me at all. As it was, the real friends and family I have were at the forefront of my mind and really helped me through.

And sometimes it was copious amounts of cheese!

I've always been a lists person and this is the best list I've ever kept.  At times I'd find myself all proud that I had uploaded my photo for that day before the morning was over, other days were more difficult.  Normal mundane days had me searching round at 9pm looking for something to snap for my challenge.  Those days usually ended up being dedicated to TV shows or whatever was in my eye line at the time.  

In short it's a totally worthwhile challenge which I'm now extending to you, go to: 100happydays.com and see if you can keep it up better than I did.    Feel free to copy my twitter handle theemiddlesis in your images too.  Cos if there's one thing that does make me happy, it's nosing at what makes others happy too!