Songs That Make you Happy

The holiday blues are real folks, and they can last way past the holidays. Pulling yourself out of a “funk”, “rut”, “dark place”, “deeply depressed state”, … whatever you want to call it, … it can be tough and feel impossible. Bottom line, it sucks. If you’re going through it, you’re not alone.

I don’t think there’s just one thing you can do to battle depression. It takes a lot, but hey – it’s worth it. A couple of days ago I had some song lyrics stuck in my head. It was more like 3 or 4 words that I wasn’t sure what a couple words were. That made it hard to figure out the song. Anyway – thanks to my awesome friend, Melissa, I figured out the song. Then I listened to it. And I listened to another. And another; heck I’ve pretty much been listening to music ever since. I used to love music. 

One sign, for me at least, that it’s depression is that lack of interest in pretty much anything. The worst part of that is that you don’t normally see it yourself; at least not right away. If you’re lucky you have people casually (or forcefully) point it out. Of course, if you’re depressed you probably see that as an insult and get offended.

…Maybe pushing everyone out of your life.

…Blowing off the people you normally rely on.

…Sinking further and further into hermit-tude.

Then one day you obsess over a few words from an obscure song and you realize you don’t listen to music much anymore. Hell, you don’t really do anything anymore. Then you wonder what happened and try to figure out when it started. That’s usually my wake-up call, my id screaming “YOU’RE DEPRESSED, SNAP OUT OF IT“. There I go insulting myself, telling myself to snap out of it like it’s that easy. Boy, do I piss myself off sometimes.

But I was kind of right. I found the song, listened to different versions of it, and loved every second. Well, looking back it felt like I did which is even better for me. Finding a happy place in such a dark place is like finding a unicorn on an island full of zebras. It’s not going to happen, but you’ll always wonder “what if”. Then you start remembering what it felt like to not be sad. Maybe just for a short time, but still.

And like I said before, it’s not always just one thing you can do to get happy, but you have to start somewhere! I start with music. So, I thought – “Hey, why not put together a playlist?”. So here it is, it’s still a work in progress because there is so much music out there. In fact,

1. Gavin DeGraw – I Don’t Want to Be
2. Neon Trees – Everybody Talks
3. Aerosmith – Walk This Way
4. Will Smith – Gettin’ Jiggy With It
5. Len – Steal My Sunshine
6. Harry Belafonte – Jump in the Line
7. Pink – F’ing Perfect
8. Selena Gomez – Who Says
9. Kenny Loggins – Footloose
10. House of Pain – Jump Around
11. Billy Joel – Uptown Girl
12. Florida Georgia Line – Cruise
13. Nelly – Hot in Here
14. Marvin Gaye & Tammi Terrell Ain’t No Mountain High Enough
15. Gloria Estefan – Conga
16. Katy Perry – Roar
17. Pitbull & Ke$ha – Timber
18. Hanson – MMMBop
19. Low Rider – War
20. Honey, I’m Good – Andy Grammar
21. Mark Ronson & Bruno Mars – Uptown Funk
22. Mr. Probz & Chris Brown & TI & Robin Shulz – Waves
23. James Brown – I Got You (I Feel Good)
24. Luke Bryan – Play it Again
25. OMI – Cheerleader
26. Rachel Platten – Fight Song
27. The Script – Hall of Fame
28. Kelly Clarkson – Strong
29. Christina Aguilera – Fighter
30. Demi Lovato – Skyscraper
31. Bob Marley – Lively Up Yourself
32. Justin Bieber – Love Yourself
33. Chaka Khan – I’m Every Woman
34. Gloria Gaynor – I Will Survive

I crowdsourced a little on Facebook and here are some of their happiest songs: