We live in an anxious world. So why am I so happy? | Rhymer Rigby

Unhappiness calls to unhappiness everywhere, but if your outlook is cheerful, nobody's interested. Admittedly, this is a good problem to have

Recently, I was chatting to a friend. She was a bit down and I was trying to cheer her up, being my usual sunny self when, suddenly, she gave me an odd look and said: You're never really unhappy, are you, Rhymer?" I had a moment of clarity. She was right. But when I told her this, she responded with bewilderment. Surely nobody can be happy all the time? That's weird. OK, I conceded, of course I experience occasional frustration, grumpiness and disappointment, but they are fleeting feelings and usually connected to discrete events. Prolonged periods of unhappiness or anxiety? Nope.

If happiness is a scale of one to 10, I am invariably between a six and an eight. Perhaps the odd, brief dip to four when something genuinely sad happens. But my default resting state is an untroubled 7.5. There is no apparent reason for this. I am lucky enough to live a pretty nice life, but I am not insulated from stress and anxiety. To take an obvious example, my mortgage is about to increase by 50% and I'm certainly not independently wealthy. What's more, I know plenty of people who are better off than me - and their happiness seems to be normally distributed. There are plenty of unhappy rich people. My sunny disposition seems innate, like being 6ft 2in, which, sadly, I'm not. My wife, who does worry about things and wishes I worried a bit more, has occasionally said that I would probably be exactly the same if I had twice as much money or half as much money.

Rhymer Rigby is a freelance journalist