RACHEL ELIZONDO: Choosing happiness … even in difficult times

Over the next several next weeks, you’ll be seeing posts that have come from my blog, choosing-happiness.com. Carlton Fletcher, my boss from when I used to work for The Herald, has graciously agreed to print these posts, and I could not be more excited about this opportunity.

This blog started after the murder-suicide of my parents back in February of this year. I have always loved to write, and if you remember me from my time at The Herald, you might already know that. And I had toyed with the idea of starting a blog before. But the right idea never really struck me. I didn’t think I could ever consistently write about the same sort of subject for a longer stretch of time. I thought that I would get bored, that I would run out of material.

Then, my father murdered my mother and then turned the gun on himself, and I was left reeling in the wake of that incredible tragedy. Shortly after, as if I didn’t have enough on my plate, COVID-19 hit like a bomb right here in southwest Georgia where I live and work. I work for a health system now, so I couldn’t get away from it. My two older sisters and my brother’s wife are also nurses and my grandfather, my only remaining grandparent and the father of my mother, is one of those people at a higher risk of losing their life from this terrible new disease. I was already in therapy (where I was diagnosed with PTSD), trying to deal with my parents’ deaths, but COVID-19 made my life even more impossible to handle.

Like everyone reading this, I was stuck at home, although I still had to go in to the office for work every day. It felt like I was stuck in a cycle that was ridden with anxiety and felt impossible to get out of. And while I didn’t feel safe taking a vacation (and probably would have struggled getting off work), I eventually realized that there were things I could do to distract myself from the chaos that was my life, that was all of our lives in that moment.

It started initially with a weekend series of mini-dates with my husband, Ron, that I was literally just using to distract myself. We set up a mini-golf course in our living room, we had a picnic in a local park, we had a “restaurant dinner” at home, we had a movie marathon in our living room, and we cooked a new recipe together. And it was right after that weekend, which had been incredibly fun and actually worked in distracting me from everything that was going on, that I realized I wanted to start a blog.

It was like something clicked in my head. I realized that while everyone couldn’t understand everything I was going through, everyone was still going through a very difficult and unprecedented time. I could write blog posts that would focus on finding a way to still live your life, to still find and choose happiness. So that’s what I did.

Since starting the blog a few months ago, the topics aren’t always the same, and things have grown and evolved. But the premise remains the same. I write about ways I am trying to choose happiness in my everyday life, even when, and especially when, it is hard. And this is not me sitting in an ivory tower writing about ways you could theoretically do this; these are things I have actually done, or am currently doing. It is about my active journey every month, every week, and every day to choose happiness.

I hope you’ll join me on that journey.