The Thief of Joy?
When I was in grad school, I got my wisdom teeth taken out. I probably didn’t follow directions (as I am known to do—not follow directions), and I got dry sockets. The pain was intense and unrelenting. After I healed, I was so thankful to eat and sleep and just walk around and feel incredible.
There is a lot of talk “out there” about comparison and how bad it is. One of the things I talk about in Like a King is how comparison is going to happen, so why not intentionally choose the direction you’ll compare?
The appreciation of good is always anchored in memory of the bad.
If you’ve had a tooth ache, or a cold, or the flu, or if you’ve ever slept on the ground in the cold. Once the bad is complete, you can finally enjoy how incredible feeling well or sleeping on a mattress in a climate-controlled room is.
Christians talk about the Gospel; the good news. The Gospel is good news because of the bad news—you’ve messed up. You’ve sinned and, in fact, you can’t even hit the mark if you wanted to. I would argue that you can’t just find joy or happiness. The happiness has to be rooted and grounded in the bad. If you’re an optimist well then, congratulations, you can “keep on the sunny side.”
But if you’re a natural-born pessimist like me, use all the bad to arrive at the good. Remember that tooth ache and contemplate how good it feels to walk around like normal human being not holding an icepack on your jaw like a zombie lunatic.
What if comparison is not the thief of joy, but the key to it? What if the vehicle to happiness is moving toward comparison?
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Note: the origin of this quote is unclear. Here are some ideas:
“Comparison is the thief of joy.”
“The thief of joy is comparison.”
“Comparison is the death of joy.”
“Comparison is the death of contentment.”
Statesman Theodore Roosevelt, humorist Mark Twain, author C. S. Lewis
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1855: Time is a thief of joys
1881: O Age, thou art the very thief of joy
1893: “It might have been” is but a thief of joy
1915: Thief of joy, worry
1918: Anticipation is, in truth, the real thief of joy
1921: Industry is the thief of joy
1977: Debt is often a thief of joy
1989: Comparison is the death of true self-contentment (John Powell)
1992: Anxiety—that thief of joy
1998: Death, that most remorseless thief of joy and time
2003: Thief of joy is comparison (Ray Cummings)
2011: Comparison is the thief of joy (Attributed to C. S. Lewis)
2012: Comparison is the thief of joy (Attributed to Theodore Roosevelt)
2013: Comparison is the death of joy (Attributed to Mark Twain)