I believe that I control my happiness. Every day, I see people that go to school, go to work, and they act as if they don’t control what happens to them. When they are sad, it is because the universe is being unfair, and when they’re elated, they accredit it to the alignment of the moon, stars, and planets. I know that they are wrong. I know because I have lost control of myself, and thus, my happiness.
       I am in a state of disrepair. My grades are slipping, my relationships are devolving, and my mind is cloudy with doubt. I am not happy. Nothing I do seems rewarding, and even the distractions I can manage to squeeze in only delay an inevitable tumble back into the depths of the dark pit I call my life.
        How did this happen? How could I let this happen? Here I am. Standing at the bottom of a hole and knowing only one thing:  I dug myself here.
         Maybe it couldn’t be helped? Sometimes I get behind, sometimes I get buried in my work, and sometimes things are bad for no other reason than just plain bad luck. I know these are somewhat true, but in my case, I know exactly what I did to get here. I made inexcusable decisions each day: to play a video game instead of finishing my math homework, to read a play instead of reading my history book, or to laze around instead of getting done what needed to be done. I chose to put-off and half-***, knowing full well that they would only dig me further into the hole. I chose to close myself off and to become snide and moody. I made these choices; I chose to be unhappy.
          I brought this future upon myself. I regret, in advance, the hours that must be spent recovering from my missteps, yet I still go on to make the same mistakes before I’ve fixed those I’ve already created. Hedonism and lack of discipline got me here. I loathe the things I wish I hadn’t done but those opportunities are in the past, forever lost. I seek to change my future. I seek to be happy once again.
          I believe that this essay has come at a bad time in my life. I am low, lower than ever before.  I want to get out of here, and it is my belief that I can, with work and determination, clamber out of this hole and rediscover the light of happiness. I will be stronger for it. By climbing out of the pit on a ladder of hard lessons, I will emerge with the wisdom that can only be learned when one faces oblivion. This I believe: happiness is something I control and there is still a chance for me to seize it. I know this because I have done it before, and I believe that I can do it again.