since when did happiness become this scary?

“Money can’t buy happiness,” as the old saying goes. Yet if our currency can never buy happiness, then why does it seem to have a price?

“I think I’m afraid of being happy.”

Coming from someone who radiates sunshine wherever she goes. From someone who smiles the widest and laughs the loudest at the simplest jokes. From someone who seems so full of life on the outside.

From me.

I do seem like a person who has gotten a fair taste of happiness in her life. A girl who has had so much more and decided to give it to others. But happiness isn’t a thing. Happiness isn’t a simple feeling. Happiness is sometimes a curse.

People talk about happiness as if it is the destination, as if reaching it means the story is over. They speak of it like a reward waiting at the end of a long road. Nobody tells you that sometimes happiness can be terrifying.

Nobody tells you how difficult it is to hold something beautiful when you know how easily it can be taken away.

I knew Happiness. She was an old friend. Yet when we started to grow apart, I also started recognizing Fear as her twin.

At first, I didn’t notice it. Fear was always standing quietly behind her, hidden beneath her shadow. Every laugh came with the fear of silence. Every good memory came with the fear of becoming a memory. Every person I loved came with the possibility of losing them.

Happiness wasn’t a gift at all; it’s a debt you acquire from fate. You live your life together with happiness, and then fate asks for an exchange. A moment with fear. And that moment can stretch long enough until you can no longer handle it.

That’s why I could never see happiness as free. Every joyful moment felt borrowed, as if someone would eventually come knocking to collect what was owed.

“Money can’t buy happiness.” Since when? Because as far as I know, it has a price. Happiness is something you have to pay for.

It has taught me that sometimes you have to sacrifice one beautiful thing for another.

I used to think pain arrived to destroy happiness. Later, I realized it often arrived because happiness existed in the first place. You cannot miss what you never had. You cannot grieve what never mattered.

And soon, I met Anger.

I hated it. The very existence of it felt like a reminder that I could never just be happy. Later on, I hated how being too happy felt like a warning sign, like a cloudy sky waiting for the strongest storm. Like low tide signaling the biggest waves.

I started becoming suspicious of my own joy. The happier I became, the more I waited for something bad to happen. It felt like every smile came with a countdown.

That’s why I’m scared to be so happy, because I know grief will follow.

It never introduced itself to me. Grief just barged in like an unwanted visitor at my party. She messed up the tables I laid out for hours, broke my favorite glass, and left with nothing but my tears behind.

And somehow, grief changes the way you see happiness. You stop celebrating good things as much because a part of you is already preparing for their ending.

Since when did happiness become this scary? What did all those years do to her? I could never recognize her anymore, nor the dolls, lollipops, and memories we once shared.

I miss the version of me that didn’t think this way. The little girl who accepted happiness without questioning it. The little girl who laughed until her stomach hurt and never wondered if tomorrow would take it all away.

The little girl who believed that good things could simply exist without consequences.

Back then, happiness felt endless. Back then, I welcomed it with open arms. Now I greet it with hesitation, wondering how long it plans to stay.

And maybe that’s what scares me the most, not that happiness leaves, but that every time it arrives, I’m already waiting for its goodbye.

Will I ever be happy in my life without worrying about what comes next? Will life ever grant me real happiness without taking it back?

Will there ever come a day when I can enjoy a beautiful moment without searching for cracks in it? A day when I can laugh without guilt, dream without fear, and love without expecting loss?

Or perhaps happiness was never meant to stay.

Perhaps it was only meant to visit, to remind us that even the most beautiful things are temporary. Perhaps its purpose was to leave traces of light in the darkest corners of our lives.

Maybe happiness and grief were never enemies at all. Maybe they have always been sisters, walking hand in hand. One arrives first, and the other follows. One teaches us how beautiful life can be, while the other teaches us how precious that beauty truly was.