Where To Look For Happiness?

“For all of us who need a reminder”

Are you happy? How do you know whether you’re happy or not? Probably by the way you feel at the present moment.

Unhappiness has many telltale signs. An observer won’t even need to hear a word to know that you feel unhappy. Your facial expression, your chin and shoulders being down. You emanate invisible negative energy that can be sensed by others around you. Chances are at any given time you feel unhappy your head is full of fear, worries and maybe even apocalyptic thoughts. All the rest of the symptoms are merely your body’s reaction to those thoughts. Have you ever walked into a restaurant or a store and sensed the negativity of the waiter or the cashier? You didn’t need anybody to tell you. It was obvious.

Happiness on the other hand is also readily apparent. Probably the most illustrious expression of happiness is a genuine, wide, full face smile. It’s impossible to feel unhappy when you are genuinely smiling. Try it for yourself! Stand in front of the mirror, show your beautiful heartfelt smile and try to feel bad at the same time. Impossible! Think about the implications of this. Think deeper. What if you made yourself smile and laugh for extended periods throughout the day? How would that affect your overall happiness? You’d be surprised!

There are 3 general types of happiness. In one form, just like unhappiness, it is your body’s reaction to your thoughts and experiences. This time the happy ones, of course! Reconnecting with a loved one after a long break, accomplishing something you’ve been working on for a while, hearing a newborn’s laughter, seeing your team win, buying that car you always wanted... Unquestionably, these events make you feel happy. And that is wonderful! Have more of them. Despite the temporary nature of experience triggered happiness the effects are powerfully positive in your life.

The second type of happiness is the one you can deliberately create for yourself without depending on outside events. Sounds too good to be true? Let’s go down the path of your memory together. Remember offering support and words of encouragement to your loved ones that really needed it? Remember that time that you helped the stranger who was dazzled by your generosity? How about when you called to sincerely congratulate your friends on their achievement? If those don’t ring a bell, think about all the little acts of kindness you do throughout the day: holding a door open for the next person, yielding to another car in the traffic, picking up a plastic bottle from the floor and putting it in a trash can in a public area, watering your beloved plants and flowers… Think back to those moments. Actually, “feel back” to those moments. How did you feel immediately after your acts of kindness? Or to be more specific, what did you feel? The answer can be only one - happiness. And how did you bring about this feeling of happiness? You got it! By your own deliberate actions that didn’t depend on anyone or anything else. What do you think about the implications of that?

The third and final type of happiness is much more profound. I call it “the permanent state of happiness”. It does not depend on events happening to you nor the events that you create yourself. It doesn’t need any input from others. It can hardly be disturbed by worldly events. It is a state of mind that resembles a crystal clear flowing river. It hits some pebbles along the way. Sometimes large rocks. Other times seemingly impassable obstacles. And yet it always, always, always finds its way through. There is only one source that is powerful and stupendous enough to sustain this kind of unstoppable happiness. It's the first cause known by different names - God, infinite intelligence, universe...The name doesn't matter. We're talking about the same thing. This type of happiness streams from your direct connectedness with this intelligence. It allows you to reap bits and pieces of happiness from everything you see and construct a full picture of happiness of life. The joy of life. The joy of living. The joy of loving. And unconditional love, which by implication includes full forgiveness, unlocks the door to infinite intelligence, to “permanent state of happiness”.

So if you’re not happy now, what can you do to turn this around and achieve full happiness? It all starts with a little spark right now. This spark will generate a chain of actions which in turn will create a nursery where your permanent happiness will be born. Do you know how the shiny stars you see in the sky are born? They are born in nurseries called nebulae which consist of clouds of gas and other elements. They are so vast that sometimes they stretch light years. And just when all the right ingredients are present at the right place a little spark ignites shiny star into existence. The one main ingredient that you need in your soul nursery to spark your happiness is...Drumroll please! GRATITUDE!

Gratitude is the emotion that can turn your life around in an instant. Attitude of gratitude is the true nursery for lasting happiness. Gratitude has the power to overturn your unhappiness by removing your focus from the things that make you unhappy and shifting them on the things that do make you happy. It’s a simple yet profound shift of perception. You may think there are too many things that make you unhappy but unquestionably there are many more things that will make you happy if only you focus on them. So that primordial spark that ignites your happiness is your willful decision, or rather resolution to start expressing gratitude for everything you already have. Start with the little things. You are alive. You are able to breathe. Just these 2 items will put you ahead of countless billions of people who are no longer able to claim these abilities. Then keep going. List your gratitude for your loved ones, list each person separately. The Earth, the sun, the moon, the water, the trees, the flowers, the seasons, the holidays, all the happy memories, every accomplishment...This list can go on indefinitely for ANY living person. Writing down the list will multiply the effects of this exercise exponentially. First of all, about 20-30 minutes into this exercise you will look at the list and realize how much you have that you never noticed and how fortunate you are to have these things. Second because of those positive feelings the universe will start attracting to you corresponding experiences through the law of attraction.

If you can sustain the attitude of gratitude by practicing it for 30-90 consecutive days your life will never be the same again. Through the habit of genuine, heartfelt gratitude you will have opened a channel of direct communication with infinite intelligence and to “permanent state of happiness”.

So, are you happy?