Happiness And Therapy:

Today my happiness score is 2! Not doing great on that front. I just got up early again after not being able to sleep until 2. That's 2 days in a row with no sleep and I'm honestly not sure why. I just know that it seems to be my head that's keeping me up. I woke up about an hour ago with a racing heart and all sorts of anxious thoughts in my head. Here are some of those thoughts:

• Anxious about how expensive Grad School is turning out to be. How will I ever pay back nearly 6 figures of debt that doesn't have any inherent value like a home loan? 
• Thoughts of dropping out of Grad School to just start working on projects instead because MONEY. 
• Thoughts about how I struggle to finish projects and not wanting Grad School to be another incomplete goal. 
• Bouncing between those two thoughts. 
  
  
• Anxious about my relationship status and how inadequate I feel in that regard.
• Money again is a factor here. There's part of me that believes I'm only worth something to women if I'm worth a lot of money. 
• BUT, if a woman does only want to be with me for money (either subconsciously or explicitly) that's not a relationship I want. 
• Bouncing between these two thoughts.
  
  
• Thoughts about all the things I WANT to accomplish, and acknowledging how little of them I have accomplished. 
• I've got a list of coding projects that I've started, but never really finished. Many of those project have potential to generate income. But I keep getting distracted with dumb things like gaming and by just having too many projects at a time (including school).
• BUT I know that while things like gaming can be a distraction, it can also be a nice relaxing release for my brain. 
• Bouncing between those two ideas and trying to figure out where the balance is between productivity and relaxation.

In short - what I'm now considering is that I may need some help working through all this. I think I may need to start up therapy again. The only issue with that is it plays into my recent anxiety about money and the cost of grad school. I'm trying to live on a razor thin budget right now... So instead I'm exploring some of the "free" telehealth options to see if those can give me a similar sounding board for my thoughts. 

Wish me luck... this has got to change. 

Today's Subjective Happiness Scale Score: 2 / 7

Instructions: For each of the following statements and/or questions, please circle the point on the scale that you feel is most appropriate in describing  you.

1. In general, I consider myself

not a very happy person 1,    2 ,   3,   4,    5,    6 ,   7 a very happy person

2. Compared to most of my peers, I consider myself

less happy 1,    2,    3,    4,    5,    6,    7 more happy

3. Some people are generally very happy. They enjoy life regardless of what is going on, getting the most out of everything. To what extent does this characterization describe you?

not at all 1,    2,    3,    4,    5,    6,    7 a great deal

4. Some people are generally not very happy. Although they are not depressed, they never seem as happy as they might be. To what extent does this characterization describe you?

not at all 1,    2,    3,    4,    5,    6,    7 a great deal

Scoring: 

To score the scale, reverse code the 4th item (i.e., turn a 7 into a 1, a 6 into a 2, a 5 into a 3, a 3 into a 5, a 2 into a 6, and a 1 into a 7), and compute the mean of the 4 items.  Norms are available in the reference below, as well as in many other publications that have used the scale (see PsycInfo).