100 Happy Days

You've seen those #hastags on a lot of people's photos. You've wondered what in the world they are doing and whether they are trying to follow the crowd. I don't know, but what I can say is that I joined the club. Let me just start off by explaining the concept of #100happydays. This is a random project that deals with the challenge of posting an image of what makes you happy EVER SINGLE day for 100 days. It seems easy, but it is not. Often we forget to either post or simply miss to think about the things that make us happy. I thought this would be a sweet project to pursue, but to my unpleasant surprise it proved to be much more than that.
I started my #100happydays on September 1, 2014. While one of the rules of the challenge is not to post photos in order to impress or compete, the reality was that I often found myself doing this for the amusement of others and not myself. I am not going to lie, because in that case I will just say it was an amazing experience. It was, but along the way I found many instances were I struggled to find the happiness in my life.
Although I am still not done--I am more than halfway-- during hard times, which happened constantly, I was brought back to reality and pushed to appreciate and find my happiness. If I could compare myself to where I am right now to the beginning, I would say I am much more comfortable in my own skin. I am much more driven to change my life, and slowly, I am beginning to care less about the subjectivity of others. Now, this is a HUGE thing for me. For the past decade I have been so  invested and consumed in making my reputation "good." Of course, only God knows what people truly think about me, and lately after a few blows I realize that I am no longer in the search of a reputation but of my own individual and unique character.
Not a day goes by that I don't analyze my life and think of what to photograph, and OF COURSE why it makes me happy. I no longer want to impress I just want to inspire.
Until my 100 days,
MB