HAPPINESS IS…?

When we think about doing something to make ourself happy our mind often goes to buying something we want, eating something we like or doing something we enjoy.

These things can certainly bring moments of happiness...even pure visceral joy if we find the right pursuit.

However ultimately these things are temporary and these moments are transient. That means that any pleasure derived is finite and often short lived.

If we’re not happy with ourself then these things become merely temporary distractions from our overall unhappiness.
Once those moments have gone and passed into memory we return to our previous state.

So it’s important that when we think about making ourself happy and taking direct action towards achieving long term, lasting happiness we focus our efforts in the right area.

The only constant in your life is that when you wake every morning you will wake up as you.
The person you see in the mirror is always you.

Whilst we might often recognise things about us that we are not happy with (perhaps there’s something about how we look that we don’t like, perhaps we’ve not been coping at work quite as well as we would wish to, perhaps we did something recently that we’re not proud of) it’s important to recognise that our long term happiness will come from improving the way we feel about ourself as a person.

What that is and how that’s done will differ from person to person.
Some will find self worth in altruism.
Some will equate their personal value in terms of business success.
Some will work to learn and increase their knowledge and understanding.

But whatever it is we put our focus on and channel our best efforts towards, ultimately our long term happiness isn’t about being happy with what we have or what we’re doing... it’s about being happy with who we are.