Recently, my husband and I were talking about how happy we are. Not just content, but properly, quietly, ridiculously happy - the kind of happy that makes you pause mid-coffee and think, wait…is this allowed?
Because somewhere along the way, it started to feel inappropriate to admit happiness out loud.
It’s not that anyone told us we couldn’t. It’s just that there’s a strange cultural shame around it now, as though joy were a limited resource that ought to be hoarded, or at least whispered about apologetically.
We live in a world that’s constantly breaking - wars, disasters, politics, AI. And in the middle of it, saying “I’m happy” can feel almost indecent. Like standing in a burning building and saying, “I’m quite comfortable, thank you.”
The Politics of Cheerfulness
There’s also a social dynamic to it. People are nicer to you when you’re struggling. Have you noticed?
Tell a friend you’re sad, and you’ll get an outpouring of sympathy. Tell them you’re happy, and you might get an eyebrow raise, a polite nod, or (worst of all) silence.
It’s not malice, it’s empathy’s little blind spot. Humans are hardwired to help. It’s one of our better features. For most of history, our survival depended on noticing pain - on rushing toward the wounded member of the tribe. We evolved to respond to suffering because it kept the group alive. Misery is a social glue; it pulls people toward you. Happiness, on the other hand, tends to offend - not because it’s wrong, but because it reminds people what they’re missing.
We’re built to protect, to comfort, to rescue. But we’re not very good at sitting beside someone whose life is simply…good.
Addicted to Sadness
There’s a lyric in Gotye’s hit song Somebody That I Used to Know that says, “You can get addicted to a certain kind of sadness.”
That line has always stuck with me - because it’s true. We can become unconsciously addicted to our sadness. Not because we like suffering, but because sadness is safe. It’s familiar. It draws people in. It makes them care.
It’s a kind of social currency: pain earns tenderness, while happiness can feel like a withdrawal from the shared account of empathy.
It’s a bit like siblings. They’ll torment each other for hours, but the second someone else makes one of them cry, they turn into warriors of compassion. We’re built to protect, to comfort, to rescue. But we’re not very good at sitting beside someone whose life is simply…good.
The Jealousy Reflex
And then, of course, there’s jealousy - that ancient reflex that hides behind politeness.
We don’t mean to feel it, but happiness in others can highlight the absences in ourselves. Someone else’s light can cast a shadow we didn’t know we had.
I remember being in one of those dark, quietly bitter chapters of life when a friend called to ask me a favor. She’d just told me she’d gotten a big promotion and was buying a beautiful house. And I remember thinking, why on earth should I add to your already perfect life? Why do you need a favor? It was definitely jealousy - and awkwardness - and I can admit that now.
Because I’ve been on both sides. I’ve been the one quietly aching when someone else’s life seemed too easy, and I’ve been the one dimming my joy because I didn’t want to seem like I was showing off.
So I get it. Happiness has an etiquette. There’s a time and a place. You’re not going to walk into a room of people who just lost a family member and shout, “You would not BELIEVE how happy I am!” That’s not joy; that’s tone-deafness. There’s a difference between sharing happiness and performing it.
The Performance of Struggle
On the internet, it’s even more pronounced. Online, misery is relatable. Struggle is good content. It’s ‘being authentic.’ We are rewarded for confessing, venting, breaking down, and reinventing.
Meanwhile, happiness gets side-eyed. Post too much of it, and you risk being called out as smug, detached, curated, or even “fake.” It’s as though joy needs a qualifying trauma to make it palatable: “I’m happy now…but I’ve been through so much.”
We’re expected to pay for our peace with public suffering.
The French Exception
After moving to France from California over two years ago, we’ve discovered that happiness here isn’t loud. It’s not manic or performative. It’s woven into daily rituals - the way people pause for lunch, the small talk with the baker, the unapologetic pleasure of a good cheese. It’s a contentment that doesn’t need to explain itself.
Living here has softened something in me. My happiness has become quieter, less self-conscious. It’s no longer the “look how fulfilled I am” kind, but the “I lit a candle and did a puzzle with my kids” kind.
And it’s also different because happiness here isn’t about accomplishment. In America, happiness is a merit badge - earned through endless striving. It’s the byproduct of being thin enough, successful enough, productive enough. The “I’ve hustled my way to inner peace” kind of happiness.
American happiness demands proof. You have to achieve it. You must exceed every goal, take the most ice baths, climb the corporate ladder, own the house with the kitchen island and the perfect marble backsplash. So when you see someone who has it all, and you don’t, it’s easy to feel like their happiness is a mirror reflecting your own failure - like maybe you’re not happy because you’re not working hard enough to be.
And maybe that’s part of why we resent happiness so much. It’s exhausting to chase it. It’s expensive to keep it. It’s fleeting once you have it.
But here in France, happiness feels simpler, slower, and infinitely more human. People are supposed to indulge in life’s small pleasures. They’re supposed to rest, to linger, to enjoy. Flashing wealth is gauche; having a fancy car is laughably un-French. People roll their eyes at that sort of thing. Here, the good life isn’t something to prove - it’s something to live.
I wrote recently about how French children are the third happiest in the world, and I think this is why. They grow up surrounded by adults who model contentment - who teach them that happiness isn’t something you have to win.
We are, simply put, much happier. And it’s the kind of happiness that doesn’t need a witness, though sometimes, I wish I could shout it anyway.
But even so, when my husband and I are sitting by the fire or watching the kids race through the garden, we sometimes feel nervous. As though something bad must be about to happen. As if happiness itself were a prelude to loss. We’ve been programmed to be wary of joy - to treat it like a storm that’s gone strangely quiet.
In Defense of Joy
So why are we so afraid of happiness?
Maybe because joy feels fragile, like something we shouldn’t jinx. Maybe because happiness can make others feel the sharp edge of their own longing. Or maybe - and this is the one that keeps circling back to me - because we’ve mistaken kindness for shared suffering, when in truth, kindness also includes letting others be well.
There’s a grace in allowing someone to be happy. It’s not indifference; it’s maturity.
And perhaps the most generous thing we can do, in a world that feels perpetually bruised, is to let happiness exist without apology. To let light coexist with shadow. To say, gently, “I’m happy,” not as a boast, but as proof that it’s still possible.
Suffering, Perspective, and the Dishwasher
I should also say, this happiness hasn’t come easily. And I realize the irony of writing about struggle here, online, in an essay about how we perform it. But there’s a difference between performing pain and reflecting on it. I’m not sharing this for sympathy; I’m sharing it because it’s quite possibly the reason joy feels so extraordinary to me now.
I’ve struggled with depression for most of my adult life. I know what it feels like to be numb, to watch other people laughing and feel like you’re pressing your face against the glass.
Maybe that’s why happiness feels so sacred to me now - because I’ve spent so much time without it.
I once heard someone on a podcast say, “Happiness is suffering.” At first I thought it was nonsense, but the more I considered it, the more it made sense. Some suffering gives happiness its shape - it’s what makes the light visible.
It’s like when our dishwasher here broke for a week. It was a tough week - annoying, mostly. But the day the new one arrived, we felt over the moon with happiness. We have a dishwasher! How lucky are we?!
It’s all relative. Sometimes joy is just realizing you don’t have to spend as much time in the kitchen.
A Small Rebellion
If sadness connects us, happiness should someday inspire us. Not as a boast, but as a quiet act of hope - proof that peace and delight are still possible, even now, even here.
So yes, we’re happy. Not perfectly, not permanently, not without hard days. But deeply, stubbornly happy.
And if that’s inappropriate, I’ll take inappropriate over performative any day.
Because in times like these, joy is not a luxury.
It’s resistance.
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