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Finding joy in the ordinary, happiness, happy, happy place, Harmony, home, Inside, joy, peace, The secret of happiness
What makes each of us ‘Happy’?
And why cant we feel like this all the time?
I recently watched an Oprah Soul Sunday on Happiness as she chatted with Shawn Achor, a Harvard trained researcher and best selling author of Before Happiness and The Happiness Advantage. Shawn tells us that happiness is a choice and this is what I have found to be true, that its up to us to choose happiness and joy everyday we step out into the world, which will determine how our days pan out. This is not to say that bad or upsetting things will not reach us, they still will however it is up to us how we choose to react to certain things we choose how our day will turn.
Many of us get up each morning and think our days are whatever ‘fate’ has in store for us but I have come to realise over the past decade or so that our thoughts are what create our days, our weeks and our lives. We determine each and every day what comes into our space by what we think about all day long, and the longer you hold a thought, good or bad, the more likely it is that you are manifesting it towards you. Even when some days are not going so great or you are in a space in time just waiting for the tide to turn or perhaps in a job you really have no passion about, try to find something each day to keep you smiling. For me its my pictures on my walls at work of the places I will go when the time is right for me to fulfill those dreams, until then, they keep me focused on my dreams and keep them alive amongst an ordinary day.
As this year is nearing its last third, I am sensing a calmer me where I am beginning to tie up all loose ends, unclutter my life just a little bit more and having decided just this week that no, I really don’t need that degree to make me or anyone else happy in my life, I feel like a huge weight has lifted from me.
I have been sitting thinking a lot recently about what really makes me happy at this stage of my life and its truly just the simple things like spending time out and about with my hubby and together dreaming of what we want to do to our home, picking out paint colours and planning what to do next, working on my plans to travel, just hanging around at home, spending time with my books, making time for myself to develop more spiritually by making time for meditation or just regular quiet time where I can hear my thoughts without constant chatter of what I think I need to be doing. Anywhere I find harmony and peace, that’s where my happy place is found.
My job now, is to find my ‘happy place’ more often than not by retreating each day just for 20 – 30 minutes into a silent world where I can be grateful for all the experiences, all the people in my life and remember all the love I can offer others for that is where my joy lies, not in climbing any career ladder or striving to be or have more, just finding beautiful experiences in my life and finding joy in the ordinary of day to day living…