How do I change my life to be happy?

[LoveIsWriting]

My philosophy in life is to be happy.
Do what makes you happy and change it if it doesn't.
The sad part is, I haven't been happy in 8 years.

I'm 16 and yeah, I was 8 when my world shot to hell...Kinda cliche'.
Anyways, when I was 8 everyone shun me from their group. I wasn't aloud to play or talk to them.
And for what reason you ask? I have no idea.
So for about 5 years I tried getting my "friends" back and it ended with me in the same place as I was 5 years prior.
I gave up trying 3 years ago...I took the hint that i'd never have the "normal" teenage life.
So I rebelled. I mean, not with drugs or alcohol (because lets face it...that is "the norm")
I started writing and reading...a lot. I spent a lot of time watching movies and tv.
What else was there to do?
I don't talk to anyone in school... The rule is, "keep your head down and hope you don't get noticed"

You have to realize that this isn't a fun way of life.
Who wants to be the shy one? When they are actually the outgoing one that nobody cares about?
I'm not shy.
I've tried this program in school where surrounding schools go take classes as one school (just go with me).
I've tried 4 of those classes and people shut me out.
I keep good hygiene, I'm polite and really nice to everyone. I know what it's like to be judged so I don't do that to other people.
I've tried to get my mom on board with homeschooling...That failed. (Don't say anything about this).
I've tried looking into schools nearby to be sent to...Way to much money.
I've tried looking for apartments with my mom...Way to much money.
I've tried volleyball, softball, cross country and tennis... Who wants to be on a team sport being the black sheep?
Basically, I've tried everything my mom and I could think of.
Do you know what it feels like to try and try and not get anywhere?
I'll tell you.
You feel hopeless. You start to question what is the point of life (I mean this as why am i here if its just miserable for me? Not in the sense I am going to kill myself...Im not) Will it always be like this? Why am I not accepted? Whats wrong with me to not be given a chance in about 8 different gatherings? And then you feel weak. You feel like you have given everything you could into making your life decent to not have any good outcome.
You know, I don't even know the last time I hugged someone. I can't remember. And I've never even kissed a guy...Which is awesome.
All I want is 1 or 2 friends to take pictures with and post on Facebook, I want to be tagged in those god awful looking pictures at parties...Normal teens have hundreds of them...I have none. Not even one picture with me and a group of people on Facebook.
I'd like to laugh and mean it. Not laugh and think, "Yeah, they believed that one just like the last."

So, for the next two years what can I do to be happy?
Just slightly, enough to have me stop crying myself to sleep every night.

[happinessisachoice]

Awww sweetheart. This makes me so sad. No one deserves to be shunned like that! I have been in your position before and I know how awful it feels! Happiness is a tricky thing. But it depends on you to be happy. Do the things you absolutely love, and maybe you will find a person who enjoys those things too! I only found my true friends when I began dancing and shared a similar passion. Now we are crazy!!! Please keep hope and know that it'll get better! I'll keep you in my prayers <3

[Been There]

Happiness is a strange thing.
We all think that it depends on things outside of ourselves.
But actually, nothing is further from the truth.

It is our attachment to getting certain things that causes our very unhappiness.
It is our wish to avoid certain other things that causes our very unhappiness.
It is our resistance to the only reality in life ... "Things Change" .... that causes our very unhappiness.
It is our dwelling on the past, our anxiety about the future ... and oddly enough, our very resistance to our unhappiness.

Remember being a child and terrified of needles?
And how, one day, you just relaxed for some reason and that was the day you realized that needles didn't really hurt all that much?

Happiness is like that. You have to be open to everything inside you and that includes your fear and pain, as well as your joy. And you have to live very-much in the moment. This very moment.

You want to be happy? Start practicing Buddhism.
The Buddhist “learns to watch changes occurring in all physical experiences, in feelings and in perceptions. He learns to study his own mental activities and the fluctuations in the character of consciousness itself. All of these changes are occurring perpetually and are present in every moment of our experiences. Meditation is a living activity, an inherently experiential activity. It cannot be taught as a purely scholastic subject.” (“Mindfulness in Plain English” by Venerable H. Gunaratana Mahayhera, a Theravadan Buddhist teacher)

Oh, I know what it feels like to try and get nowhere.
I went back to university in my mid-30's, because I was tired of boring stressful low-paying work. I have a high IQ and I wanted to use it.
After year 1, my husband left me and our daughter.
After year 2, my child was diagnosed with schizophrenia, which was not-responsive to any known treatment.
After graduation, there was a recession and a down-sizing frenzy, and the only work I could find was the work I went to school to get away from.
That was followed by bankruptcy when my ex stopped paying child support, and my child's mental illness became worse. I'd get calls from the day-care demanding that I come get her. Or calls saying to come get her and never bring her back.
I fell in love, but this man couldn't cope with my daughter's illness either. Lost him.

I cried myself to sleep every night for about 8 years.
Then I started meditating.
My daughter is better, I'm still poor, I still work a sh*t job, I now have heart problems and untreatable irregular cardiac arrhythmias. It takes everything I have to work, and I have nothing left over to have a life with it. Still without a man in my life, haven't hugged anyone (besides my daughter) in years.
I'm happy. I smile often. Love life, enjoy life.
It's all in what goes on inside you, my dear.
And really, nothing about what's happening on the outside (and that even includes your physical health)

Happiness is a choice, although you have to know how to make that choice work.
UNhappiness, on the other hand, is also a choice, but it's one you don't have to have any skill at.