Happiness Over The Holidays

Abraham Lincoln said “Most people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be.”

It is not what happens to us in life that determines our happiness so much as the way we react to what happens.

If you just lost your job, you can decide that now you have the opportunity to go back to school, explore new possibilities or be self employed.  Your friend might, under the same circumstances, decide to sit at home feeling sorry for themselves or give up on life and commit suicide.  One person sees opportunity while another sees only disaster.

If we lose a loved one of course we see no opportunity, but the fact remains that we decide how we react and in turn how we heal.

Even if we lose control, that is still a decision that we make.  Being happy is not always easy and is one of the greatest challenges of life.  Life is hard and it takes all the determination, persistence and self-discipline that we can muster to control our happiness.

We decide the thoughts we think – no one else controls our mind.  To be happy, we need to concentrate on positive thoughts.  Example:  How often do we ignore the compliments that are paid to us and yet dwell on an unkind remark for weeks afterwards?  If you allow a negative remark to occupy your thoughts, you will attract more negative feelings.

Remember, we are in control of our own thoughts.  Most people remember the good things for a few minutes and the insults for years afterwards.

If we are not careful we will carry about the trash that was said or done to us over the next twenty years.  If you are thinking that you want to be a really happy person someday, why don’t you start now?

The day that you decided to be a whole lot happier than you were before – you will be stunned because it actually works!

Ask happy people how they came to be so happy and their answers may sound like this:  “I had enough misery, heartache, loneliness and I DECIDED to change my life.”  Being happy means cleaning out your “mental home” – throwing out the trash and hanging onto the treasures. 

  • Being happy is seeing the beautiful view instead of the dirty windows.
  • Being happy is choosing who you hang with.
  • Being happy requires looking for the positive every day.
  • Being happy requires being grateful for what you do have.

The bottom line is that happiness is a choice – many wealthy people are unhappy and many healthy people are unhappy while many poor and sickly people are happy and grateful.  It’s your choice – choose well!

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