Happiness Is a Decision; Choose to be Happy

By Mel Kaye

Everything depends on your attitude, even happiness. Attitude is the underlying force in your life. Everything we do and everything we feel are both decisions and choices that affect our attitude. At any point during the day we “decide” based on our available “choices” what happens next. Happiness is no different. It sounds trite, I know, but you can decide at any time to choose to be happy or to choose to be unhappy.

As an example; you are excited about a day of outdoors activity, but it rains. At this point you have choices: You can choose to be miserable and unhappy all day for the anticipated pleasure that is lost; or you can choose to look at the rainbow and marvel at its beauty; you can choose to read and enjoy a good book; you can choose go see a movie; you can choose to be with your significant other and be thankful for their presence; you can choose to create something; you fill in the choice……or you can choose to be miserable. It really is up to you. You must learn to let go of disappointments (a topic to be covered in a later post.)

I believe in simplicity which is why I won’t go into a long essay on the subject. As reinforcement, I have put forth quotes that, in different ways, say the same thing: Happiness is a decision and a matter of the attitude you choose to have.

Read the following quotes. Take the the ones that feel right to you and right them down. The act of writing helps commit them to memory and make them yours. Paste them up on your bathroom mirror or on your fridge. Put them where you can see them and continuously be reminded of them. As in my post "Are You A Monday Morning Winner," you must train your mind as you would your muscles. Repeat the quotes until they become part of you; until they become part of your Attitude, The Ultimate Power.

QUOTES:
"I am still determined to be cheerful and happy, in whatever situation I may be; for I have also learned from experience that the greater part of our happiness or misery depends upon our dispositions, and not upon our circumstances."
Martha Washington

"Happiness is not by chance, but by choice."
Jim Rohn

"Be happy while you’re living, for you’re a long time dead."
Scottish Proverb

"Happiness is not a matter of good fortune or worldly possessions. It's a mental attitude. It comes from appreciating what we have, instead of being miserable about what we don't have. It's so simple—yet so hard for the human mind to comprehend."
Bits and Pieces

"Happiness lies in our own backyard, but it’s probably well hidden by crabgrass."
Dell Crossword Puzzles

"All the happiness you ever find lies in you."
Anonymous

"For every minute you are angry, you lose 60 seconds of happiness."
Anonymous

"Happiness is like jam. You can't spread even a little without getting some on yourself."
Anonymous

"Happiness is the art of never holding in your mind the memory of any unpleasant thing that has passed."
Anonymous

"He alone is the happy man who has learned to extract happiness not from ideal conditions but from actual ones about him."
Anonymous

"Much happiness is overlooked because it doesn’t cost anything."
Anonymous

"Some people cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go."
Anonymous

"Some pursue happiness — others create it."
Anonymous

"Sometimes we miss happiness by looking too far for things nearby."
Anonymous

"Stop searching. Happiness is right next to you."
Anonymous

"Most people would rather be certain they’re miserable, than risk being happy."
Dr. Robert Anthony

"Happiness depends upon ourselves."
Aristotle

"Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself, in your way of thinking."
Marcus Aurelius Antoninus

"The best way to pay for a lovely moment is to enjoy it."
Richard David Bach

"You can make yourself happy or miserable — it's the same amount of effort."
Ray Bradbury

"Remember happiness doesn't depend upon who you are or what you have; it depends solely on what you think."
Dale Carnegie

"Success is getting what you want; happiness is wanting what you get."
Dale Carnegie

"The office of government is not to confer happiness, but to give men the opportunity to work out happiness for themselves."
William Emery Channing

"In our daily lives, we must see
That it is not happiness that makes us grateful,
But the gratefulness that makes us happy."
Albert Clarke

"The purpose of our lives is to be happy."
Dalai Lama

"A happy person is not a person in a certain set of circumstances, but rather a person with a certain set of attitudes."
Hugh Downs

"The gift of happiness belongs to those who unwrap it."
Andrew Dunbar

"Happiness consists more in small conveniences of pleasures that occur every day, than in great pieces of good fortune that happen but seldom to a man in the course of his life."
Benjamin Franklin

"The U.S. Constitution doesn't guarantee happiness, only the pursuit of it. You have to catch up with it yourself."
Benjamin Franklin

"Happiness is a man’s greatest achievement; it is the response of his total personality to a productive orientation toward himself and the world outside."
Erich Fromm

"Happiness is not a destination. It is a method of life."
Burton Hills

"Happiness doesn’t depend on what we have, but it does depend on how we feel towards what we have. We can be happy with little and miserable with much."
W. D. Hoard

"The search for happiness is one of the chief sources of unhappiness."
Eric Hoffer

"The happiest people seem to be those who have no particular reason for being happy except that they are so."
Dr. David Ralph Inge

"When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us."
Helen Keller

"If life gives you a lemon, make lemonade."
Anonymous

As always, I welcome your comments and suggestions.