The Secret To Be Truly Happy:
Is happiness your “birthright”? In the Toltec wisdom book The Mastery of Love, Don Miguel Ruiz explains, “That is the reason you are here: To play and have fun. We are born with the right to be happy, with the right to enjoy life.”
If that’s the case, and I fully believe it is based on more than 40 years in my professional practice aiding people in their quest to achieve holistic happiness, just how do we achieve happiness – a combination of how satisfied you are with yourself and how good you feel day-to-day?
There are as many answers to this question as there are happiness experts and
holistic happiness coaches. One, Edward de Bono, writes, “The happiness purpose is to be achieved through the use of thinking, and humor and dignity.” He adds, “Happiness is based on the use of and change in perceptual patterns that create the world in which we live.”
This can be understood through the words of Gunars Neiders, “Each one of us sculpts his or her own happiness” and “The Meaning of Life.” Life is too serious to be taken too seriously.”
Thinking, humor, dignity, and perceptual patterns. So happiness is grounded in the way in which we view ourselves, others and the world we’re in. Makes sense, right? After all, you aren’t still living in the dark ages and believing happiness comes from anything external in your life, are you?
What is happiness? In her 2007 book, “The How of Happiness”, positive psychology researcher Sonja Lyubomirsky defines happiness as “the experience of joy, contentment, or positive well-being,
combined with a sense that one’s life is good, meaningful, and worthwhile.”
Abraham Lincoln used to say: “Most people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be.” Try these beliefs for a week of mindset changing happiness and increased life satisfaction from Albert Ellis, Ph.D.:
- It’s definitely nice to have people’s love and approval, but even without it I can still accept and enjoy myself and be happy.
- Doing things well is satisfying, but it’s human to make mistakes. I can still be happy.
- People act the way they want, not the way I want. I can still be happy.
When you’ve fully slowed down enough to insure that you feed these thoughts, and guide your steps with these very happiness inducing beliefs, you’ll begin to change your perceptual pattern of how you see your world, create more self-dignity and even find humor in your day-to-day interactions. So, even if others aren’t “nice” or “fair” to you, you goof up, you get a flat tire, you STILL decide to feel happiness. After all, what in the world does your game getting rained out have to do with your happiness? That’s the way to build authentic happiness –creating adaptability, adjusting and thinking.
I am not into “tough love,” but happiness is your own business, your own creation, and your own responsibility. No matter how big the lottery is that you won, how much larger your mansion is than your neighbor’s, how cool your
personal jet is, or how skinny and strong you are – or aren’t – happiness is an inside job. It always has been.
Someone is rude to you? They aren’t raising a finger as much as saying, “Give me your happiness!” Huh? That’d be your choice entirely, so the best answer to create holistic happiness is, “Thanks but I think I’ll keep my happiness.”
Why keep your happiness? Happy people are healthier people, live longer, have more fulfilling relationships, tend to be more productive at work, prevent stress more effectively – enough reasons to keep your joy and not give it away.
Here are my top 10 favorite habits to create holistic happiness. I’ve put them in the form of questions for you to quickly assess yourself, and see what you can add to your daily life for greater joy:
1. Have you connected with yourself, to make yourself your priority?
2. Is increasing happiness your focused goal?
3. Do you keep a happiness/gratitude/kindness notebook?
4. Do you fill your days fully engaged with things you enjoy (NOT that “MAKE”you happy)?
5. Do you awake with thoughts of what will go RIGHT instead of what can go wrong?
6. Do you understand that holistic happiness is an aligned state of mind, heart and soul and therefore…
7. Do you take care of your full body by getting restorative sleep, enough exercise and feed your body with proper nutrition?
8. Do you act kindly towards others (holistic happiness is a 360-degree experience – if others around you aren’t happy, chances are you will have a more difficult time feeling it)?
9. Do you train your mind to always see the good in people and situations in your life, thinking less critically and more positively?
10. Do you hold the door open for others, smile at the first five people you see every day, let someone go first, smile and say “Thank you,” and build a mindset of gratitude?
