Happiness isn't all about money, fast cars and a body to die for. Happiness comes from inside, it's something we choose to experience..or not. Ian Lynch Project Manager and Life Coach for the Happiness Project explains...
If ever there was one simple thing you could do for yourself that would bring you more happiness and success into your life than perhaps you have felt possible, it is this:
Set aside half an hour, yes half an hour (that’s one TV sitcom or a soap episode), find somewhere where you can be still and with pen and paper preferably (as Julie Cameron author of The Artists Way) begin a dialogue on what happiness really is for you.
You see, happiness is a choice, it does not wait on circumstance it waits on welcome. Happiness come from within and is fed by the ideas, thoughts and beliefs we hold more than it is by what happens to us from outside. In other words, nothing in the world can make you happy but everything in the world can encourage you to be happy.
Happiness is an inside job. From this starting point we can breathe, take a moment and be still. Happiness is an inner smile; yet some thought patterns would have us follow side streets that take us into seedy, unfriendly places, where happiness has to be chased, earned, gained, won, bought or owned. Your happiness is up to you. So where to begin?
Gratitude: Gratitude brings us gifts. Gifts that we already have. It allows us to celebrate again and again, our existence, our experiences, our being, our friends, or family, all the things that we enjoy and the people who make them or create them, the natural world, the cosmic miracle, ice-cream, swans, chocolate and funny films. There is so much in this world to excite us and be thankful for, kids see it, kids’ get excited. Then as we grow, it becomes all too familiar. Start a gratitude journal, a begin to see how much there is each day to be grateful for, because…
It is the present where we can truly experience happiness. Milk the sacred now!
Present; a gift, here ( I am present) and now. All definitions of this cutting edge moment of your existence where life happens and guess what, you can choose how you want to be each and every moment. When you got up today, did you rise and shine or rise and whine? Did you start your to do list immediately or did you have coffee first? What did you do? Take a shower, fed the kids and the husband, took the dogs for a walk, put the radio on, listened to new age music. What did you do? If you want to bring more happiness into your life, start a brand new habit.
Choose how you want to be today. Do you want to be funny, do you want to be a forgiver so you can move on, do you want to be a friend, a wise person, a lover, a charmer, a gift to the world? How could you be today? How happy do you want to be today? 1 to 10, how happy do you want to be? A 4, a 5 perhaps, or maybe an 8? There is no right answer, it is an enquiry. If a 6, what is preventing you from being a 7? Is it real or imagined or are you limiting your happiness before the day has even got started?
Happiness is a way of travelling. It is sexy and attractive. We like happy people and we shun the miserable ones. Not so good if we are the latter.
So if you want more happiness in your life, why not start today? Your happiness is your gift to the world and the world cries out for happy people like you.
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