When I'm going through a bad patch, someone inevitably tries to make me feel better by pointing out all those people who have it much worse than I do. This inevitably makes me feel even worse than I did to begin with. (This is not to be confused with hearing from someone who needs my support. It's more along the the lines of, "Well, at least you're not as badly off as.....")

Hearing about/from others who are doing well and are happy, on the other hand, inevitably cheers me up. So as far as I'm concerned, you're doing a public service simply by talking about being happy. If we all were miserable at the same time, where would we find hope?