And on the fifth day, I smiled about cutting bait.

So I've recently realized that some things in your life exist entirely to drag you down. I've also been intelligent enough to realize that if things exist in your life entirely to drag you down, then you should probably get rid of them. I've also been intelligent AND blessed enough to be able to start doing that.

I think one of the foundations of being a happy, functioning person is having the ability to let things go. Sometimes, things are just entirely out of your control, and you need to get out while you can save your sanity. I am a person who gets incredibly hung up on tiny things: things people say and do, what they want and need. I'm generally the kind of person who lets these things eat him up. And in reality, I still am, but today had some special circumstances where I was able to finally say "Eh, I don't need this. I'm done." I won't bore you with the specifics, but I was proud of myself.

This is massively important to me, and I hope to try and repeat it more often.

As for the official tally, 360 smiles to go, and I'm already trying to squeeze out metaphorical reasons to grin ;0

You know what's funny, though? I started doing this as a way of mentally training myself: if I inundated myself with happiness, there's no way I could still be sad, right? It was reconditioning that Big Brother would've admired. The funny thing is, though, that the more I focus on being happy, the less I have to worry about picking specific happy moments: they all seem to be running together, now...almost like I'm happy most of the time. Sweet.

Big smiles tonight, people. It appears I'm learning something.

-Eli