Making the best of hard times — how people can choose their reactions to challenging periods in their lives

“Happiness is not a goal, it’s a by-product.” — Eleanor Roosevelt

“Beth remembered it as the best time in her life,” the museum volunteer told me. “Because even though they had nothing, every day they worked to make something out of nothing.” 

I’ve been researching South Dakota life from around 1910 to 1950 for a historical novel I’m writing. Recently, my husband and I took a road trip to northwestern South Dakota and stopped at several small, local museums staffed by volunteers who were eager to share stories. They told me about tough times: food was scarce; weather could be ferociously cold or suffocatingly hot; disease, fires, and accidents were a constant concern.  But they also informed me that for many, those were happy times. The theme in our conversations: economic depressions aren’t always depressing. 

What makes hard times happy times?

When I was straight out of college, I taught American history in Madison. My students interviewed folks in the area who’d lived through the Depression years (characterized by ferocious dust storms like the one pictured above from wikimedia commons) of the 1930s. I was surprised to find that many of the stories they collected described a happy time when people had little in the way of material goods, but still considered themselves rich. Rich in relationships. People pulled together as a community and found that being generous and kind, caring and sharing, provided a wealth of happiness. 

A conversation I had years ago with an uncle from McLaughlin yielded the same information. My uncle was in his 90s and I asked him, “When you look back on your life, what are some of your fondest memories?” He responded that he enjoyed the Depression years.

Curious, I asked why. “Because everyone was equal. The banker wasn’t any better than the farmer. We were all struggling, and we all pulled together to help each other out.” 

The museum volunteers I talked to told me stories of orphans in the small South Dakota communities whose parents had died of various causes — war, disease, accidents. Some parents couldn’t afford to keep all their offspring. The children were taken in by families who had little room or food to spare, but lots of love to offer.

One museum volunteer told me, “My parents took in whatever child needed caring for. We all slept on the floor together, played together. I didn’t even know about how people differentiated folks by skin color or where they were born until I was a teenager.”

She had fond memories of those times. 

There was plenty of tragedy. Not everyone survived. Many left for what were literally greener pastures. Indigenous families were heartbreakingly separated when children were taken by force to boarding schools, programmed to be ashamed of who they were and to become what government and religious leaders wanted them to be. Some people flourished while others perished.

What made the difference? How were some people able to persevere? The answer for many: a caring community and supportive relationships.

I’ve been on mission trips to Lithuania, Nicaragua, Peru, Palestine, and Kenya. Exchanging gifts is culturally valued everywhere, and I’ve always received as well as given gifts — the most memorable being a live chicken.  However, the material gifts weren’t nearly as important as the friendships and cultural insights that I gained.

I’ve found it’s easy to get caught up in our society’s focus on the dollar value of gifts and miss out on rich lessons we can gain from countries we often label as “Third World” — as if we’ve discovered a legitimate way to rank nations. 

I’ve learned that showing kindness and bestowing dignity is, in many ways, more important than providing food and material goods. Once, when sharing food with those in need, a man told me, “What’s important is that you feed our souls, not just our bodies.” 

Our bodies need food to live, but our souls need love and dignity. Without a sense of belonging, purpose, and meaning, we can lose our will to live. 

I feel sad when I read statistics about the rise in mental health problems and suicide rates in this country. Our society’s problems are different than those of 100 years ago, but human beings haven’t changed. We still need a supportive community, a place where we feel we belong, and an identity that provides us with dignity and purpose. Generosity and compassion need to be abundant. Hatred, anger, and fear scarce.  

I bought a copy of the “Timber Lake and Area Centennial History: 1910-2010” that included stories from various people who lived in the area during that time. William E. Coats, whose homestead became part of the Firesteel townsite, shared a message he gave the people of his church in the early 1900s (pages 131-2). I’ll share part of it with you:

 “We came here as strangers but with interests in common, which made it easy to become acquainted and now live as a great family of brothers and sisters. Not one of us is better than his neighbor. There is no caste, no faction, no highbrow, no lowdowns, no rich, no poor. We all like each other. Let us all try and keep it this way by overlooking each other’s faults and shortcomings. When we can say no good thing about our neighbor, let us be silent and hold our peace.” 

Mr. Coats had high hopes for his community. It’s not easy for us humans to respect people we disagree with, whom we fear will take more than their fair share and mess with our way of life. But I think we need more people with Mr. Coat’s attitude, idealistic as it may be. 

If we look around with hope and excitement at the thought of creating something beautiful and meaningful — whether we have nothing or many things – we may experience some of the purpose and meaning that helped those rugged pioneers and resilient indigenous people survive and thrive in a challenging environment. 

If we can dream of making a better life not just for ourselves, but for everyone in our community — no exceptions — we may find that joy replaces fear and despair. By working together in harmony, we can face the future with courage. And we may find out that is what makes us truly happy. 

 Christy Heacock, PhD, is an educator with a doctorate in research psychology. She is the author of Being Human Is Hard: Choose Forgiveness. She grew up in Redfield, SD, and has lived in Rapid City the last 40 years with her husband Roger. Contact Chris at christyheacock@gmail.com or through her website: chooseforgiveness.com.