🧩 Finding Happiness While Still Hurting: ADL Episode 9
- Ms. Amber O.
- Jun 6
- 3 min read
Updated: 6 days ago
The Mango Happiness Project
My Soul Tokens | The Amber Dea Lux Show
There is a strange myth we inherit somewhere along the way.
The idea that happiness and grief cannot exist in the same place.
That if you're still hurting, you're not healing.
That if you're smiling, you've somehow betrayed your sadness.
That joy arrives only after the hard part is over.
But life has taught me something very different.
Grief and joy are not opposites.
They're roommates.
And sometimes they sit at the same table.
Sometimes they ride in the same car.
Sometimes they occupy the same heart.
For a long time, I thought healing meant reaching a place where the pain disappeared. I thought one day I would wake up and feel finished with it. Stronger. Better. Healed.
But healing didn't arrive that way.
Instead, life slowly showed me that I could miss someone deeply and still laugh.
I could feel grateful while carrying sadness.
I could be rebuilding while still broken-hearted.
I could be hurting and still experience happiness.
Both things could be true.
And that's where The Mango Happiness Project began.
The Bright Orange Reminder
After my mother passed away, life felt heavy.
Not dramatic.
Not catastrophic.
Just heavy.
The kind of weight grief quietly places on your shoulders when you're trying to keep moving through everyday life.
And then, unexpectedly, a bright orange car entered the picture.
The paint color was called Go Mango.
Bold.
Loud.
Impossible to ignore.
A rolling piece of sunshine.
The car didn't erase my grief.
It didn't fix anything.
It didn't make the sadness disappear.
But it became something important.
A reminder.
Proof that joy was still allowed to exist.
Proof that life could contain both loss and beauty at the same time.
I didn't buy happiness.
I didn't replace grief.
I simply allowed something bright to sit beside something painful.
And that changed everything.
The Power of Micro Joy
Most of us think happiness has to be big.
A vacation.
A promotion.
A new relationship.
A major breakthrough.
But during difficult seasons, happiness often arrives in much smaller packages.
I call them mango moments.
Tiny acts of sweetness.
Small reminders that life is still happening.
A favorite song.
Coffee on the porch.
Fresh flowers.
A long drive.
A sunset.
A conversation that makes you laugh unexpectedly.
Five quiet minutes in the sun.
None of these things solve grief.
They don't heal trauma.
They don't erase loss.
But they remind your nervous system that beauty still exists.
And sometimes that's enough for today.
The Guilt Nobody Talks About
There's another side to grief that people don't discuss very often.
The guilt.
The strange feeling that if you're happy, even briefly, you've somehow abandoned what you've lost.
As though joy means you didn't love deeply enough.
As though moving forward means leaving someone behind.
But love isn't measured by suffering.
And grief isn't proven by how miserable we remain.
The people we love don't become more honored because we stop living.
If anything, the opposite is true.
We honor them by continuing.
By laughing.
By loving.
By creating.
By experiencing the life we still have.
Not because we're over it.
But because we're still here.
What Healing Really Looks Like
I don't think healing is choosing happiness over pain.
I think healing is making room for both.
It's sitting at the table with grief on one side and gratitude on the other.
It's learning to carry loss without letting it carry you.
It's understanding that sadness doesn't make you broken.
And joy doesn't make you disloyal.
It simply makes you human.
Life isn't asking us to choose one emotion.
It's asking us to hold many.
To become large enough for all of them.
A Soul Token For Today
If you're walking through a difficult season right now, I want to leave you with this:
You do not have to wait until you're fully healed to experience something beautiful.
You do not have to earn happiness.
You do not have to complete grief before joy is allowed back in.
Look for your mango.
Not the solution.
Not the answer.
Not the finish line.
Just one small, bright thing that reminds you life is still here.
Because healing isn't always about feeling better.
Sometimes it's about remembering that sweetness still exists.
And allowing yourself to taste it.
✨
The Mango Happiness Project is a reminder that grief and gratitude can coexist, that healing is rarely linear, and that sometimes the smallest moments carry the most light.
— Amber💗
ADL Recommendation: Let That Sh*t Go: A Journal for Leaving Your Bullsh*t Behind and Creating a Happy Lifeđź“”
Comments