In 2021, my son turned 18.
He wanted to get his first tattoo. I thought: if he is doing this, I am doing this too. We would get them together, on the same day, as a memory of that moment. Something we would carry with us.
I went back and forth on what to get. There were a few ideas. None of them felt quite right. And then I landed on this: Choose Happiness. Two words. Three syllables. Something I could read on my own wrist every day.
I chose it because I needed the reminder.
I have had setbacks in my life. Real ones. The kind that knock you sideways and make you question everything. And for a while, I did what most people do. I sat in the pain. I sulked. I let it weigh on everything.
But at some point I realised something: my sulking was not moving anything forward. It was not healing the wound. It was not helping my loved ones who were watching me go through it. It was not helping me. I was just making the same hard road harder.
And that is when I understood what choosing happiness actually means.
It is not about pretending things are fine. It is not about forcing a smile. It is about deciding, consciously and deliberately, that you are not going to let the difficulty of the moment be the whole story of the moment.
Happiness is not something you find outside.
It is not waiting in the next job, the next relationship, the next version of your life. It is a decision you make today, in this moment, with what you have.
Life will always throw lemons. It will not always look the way you planned. And when it doesn't, you have exactly one real choice: stay there, or move.
The tattoo is the reminder to move.
Having it engraved on your body makes a real difference.
I do not know how many people can relate to this, but it is true. It is not decoration. It is not just ink. It changes something in you, in how you carry yourself, in what you come back to when things get hard. When it is written on your skin, it becomes part of how you see yourself.
I have another tattoo too. But that is a story for another time.
When people see it, they always smile. They say it is sweet. They say it is a good reminder.
It is. For them, sometimes.
But mostly, it is for me.