Happiness In Challenging Times

The secret to true happiness lies in your own mind. You have heard that money can’t buy happiness, and it’s true. Neither can the people in your life create happiness for you. No matter what (or who) you have, or what good luck you experience you can still be unhappy. We have all known people who have it all, yet still are not happy. They have made their own misery, and from an outsider’s perspective it’s usually easy to see how. Now consider this – the reverse is true. No matter what (or who) you lack in your life, and no matter how much bad luck you experience you can still be happy. Just create your own happiness. How?
It has been said that life is 99 percent perspective, and one percent experience. While your percentages may vary, you can use this formula as your guiding light. So you had a bad day – was it really a bad day, or do you have a bad perspective on the day? Often unhappiness stems from the little things in life.
Maybe you burnt your toast; broke a shoelace; arrived late for work; and had a customer yell at you – all before lunchtime. These things catch your attention because you have to respond. You had to re-make breakfast; get new shoelaces; apologize to the boss; and sooth a ruffled customer. The trick is, once it’s dealt with don’t let it keep your attention.

Instead of spending your lunch time re-hashing all the bad luck of the morning, spend it thinking about the happiness of the good luck you had. These things don’t catch our attention because they don’t pose a problem we need to address. We have to seek them out and make an effort to focus attention on them.  Maybe your kids brought home a good report card; you didn’t catch that cold going around the office; the traffic light turned green just as you approached; or the first bloom on your rose bush opened this morning. Let these things hold your attention.
This is a way of living, a way of thinking. If you practice it regularly you will find it’s a great help when the not-so-small problems pop up. A friend of mine was in a motorcycle accident a few years ago and broke his foot. About a year later he injured his shoulder in an on the job accident. Several months after that, he was in a car accident resulting in a minor concussion.

When I commented on his bad luck, he responded by asking what bad luck I was talking about. “Three times in the past two years I could have been killed. I’m alive and fully recovered – I call that good luck!” This small comment really made me realize how much the theory that life is mostly perspective applies even in serious cases.
For many people, the most difficult time to find happiness is when grieving. If you have lost someone you love, it doesn’t seem like there is an ‘upside’. The little good things don’t seem to matter. Yet, this is also the situation when the power of happiness is at it’s greatest. There is a reason you miss this person so much. You had good times; you still have good memories.

Don’t let your thoughts of your dearly departed focus on what you have lost, but what you have gained. Imagine if you had never known this person. Think of all the joy, all the love, all the good memories you would have missed out on. By far the most inspirational speech I heard at a funeral was along these lines. The speaker said “I will not speak of loss, but of gain. The world is a better place and we are all better people for the time we were blessed with my good friend. I will not mourn – I will celebrate the life and legacy of my good friend.”
In any situation, never underestimate the power of happiness. It can turn a cloudy day sunny, and turn bad luck into good. It can take you from simply existing to truly living. Most of all, never underestimate your own power to create happiness.

Happiness is a conscious choice, however it is not a switch you can flip. You can read all the ‘words of wisdom’ this world has to offer. Yet you still can’t go to bed a miserable person and wake up a happy one. It is like going on a diet – it takes effort or it won’t work and if you don’t change your eating habits, the weight will come right back. In the same manner, if you don’t work on being happy you won’t be, and if you don’t change your thinking habits the unhappiness will come right back.
As unpleasant as it is, unhappiness is easy – because it’s a habit. When we focus on the negative and expect the worst it becomes a habit. When we focus on the positive and expect the best, that becomes a habit. Every time you catch yourself thinking something negative, or dwelling on something that makes you unhappy counteract it. Deliberately think of something positive. Make a point of focusing your mind on something that will make you happy. Before long, it becomes a habit.
Certainly there will be times when happiness eludes you. Grief, anger, fear, and sadness are natural emotions. They are unavoidable, and at times healthy. However, it is never unavoidable nor healthy to wallow in these kinds of emotions. The darkest moments of your life need not be more than just that – moments.
A successful businesswoman in my town was asked her secret to success. She replied “…by finding an opportunity in everything. When our company meets a challenge, we turn it to our advantage in some way even if it’s a small advantage. That way, we always win.” This same principle can be applied in life just as easily as in business.
Crisis and tragedy are moments in a lifetime. They pass; they are not the everyday normal. However, the darkness you feel in these moments can become a normal that caries with you if you allow it. On the other hand, if you have the happy habit, your mind will naturally gravitate back to the normal lightness as those dark moments fade.
There is an expression ‘remember – it could always be worse’.

While this may sound like a cliché, it is good words to live by.  One of my best friends was trapped in an oppressive, abusive marriage with a cruel and controlling man for years. When she finally decided to end it, she fell into a depression for several months. Although it seemed she should be happy, she said that she couldn’t quit mourning the years of her life she had lost, and she didn’t even know how to be free after living under his thumb for so long.
When my friend seemed to turn a corner rather suddenly I was surprised.

She began gaining confidence, dating again, and seemed to be taking pleasure in life for the first time since before her marriage. When I inquired what had made the difference, she said it was the national news. After watching a story about women in a horribly, violently repressive third world country she kept thinking what if she had been born there.

What if she had never known freedom before her marriage; what if atrocities worse than she suffered were acceptable and legal; what if there had been no escape… “My heart broke for these women” she said “Seeing the opportunities they don’t have, suddenly made me see what opportunities I do have.” It’s all a matter of perspective, and a choice to see the happiness and light, or see the dark in your life.