Happiness

Sunday’s post, on the direction of my faith and church life over the last decade attracted a number of comments, here on the blog and via other channels. Suffice it to say some folks were genuinely worried about my level of “happiness.”

Whilst I appreciate that not being actively connected to a church and expressing some thoughts that could be considered “doubts” in public goes against the grain of a lot of the culture of contemporary evangelicalism I am, right now, a long way from being unhappy.

Sure, I could catalogue a number of things in my life that I wish were different. I live in a city where I have few friends, small networks and my career is not really “appreciated.” But compared to last year, things are better on every count. I’ve stuck with some changes and plans and they have paid off. I can’t say I love Hong Kong, but I don’t feel as alienated as I did this time last year.

Whilst I am not, as a writer or academic where I thought I would be ten years ago, I am writing regularly. My blog readership is slowly growing again (not that raw numbers ever meant much to me anyway). I finished a surprising good draft of a novella late last year and I’m finally enthusiastic again about some long term writing projects.

I’m also thrilled, on an almost daily basis by my renewed involvement in photography. I’m being asked to take photos and encouraged to think about doing more with the photos I take.

As for the question of faith, well I think that is a lot more humble and less oriented on happiness and safety. In a way, I think this recent post from Donald Miller reflects a lot of where I am at on that score right now.

All of which is my way of saying that Sunday’s post was not about how bad my life is, rather about how differently it has turned out compared to what I expected.