If you’re like other humans, which is quite obvious, you chase money, you do whatever you can to leverage your social reputation, and try to impress people.
You work harder to gain a greater sense of accomplishment and don’t miss an opportunity to do what can make you feel better about yourself – whether it’s buying fancy objects, eating your favorite delicacy or enjoying for a while.
Even if you think of yourself as different, you do what others do. We’re all similar.
In the end, you realize that nothing make you as happy as much as you had expected. Your expectations always turn out to be an illusion – and illusions break.
What you might expect to miraculously change your life will soon seem normal to you.
You can surely achieve what you work for, and yet discover that your want for happiness remained unfulfilled.
Once you find what you search for, you raise your expectations and go around in circles again, without realizing that you’ve set yourself on a never-ending journey.
Money is a dream and a source of happiness only until you have enough of it, after which it only becomes a means to fulfilling your wants and acts much like a tool.
Relationships and aren’t ever blissful either. They’re never perfect, yet you keep carrying on with them.
If you think that fulfilling your dreams and becoming capable of doing what you’re passionate about would make you blissful then you’re as wrong.
Sure it feels great, but your passion too may not hold its effect on you forever.
Then what is it that can keep you happy forever and put an end to your search for?
What is the only thing – habit, possession, idea or change which can make that smile stay on your face, forever?
Two years back
I could’ve written what I’m writing right now two years ago – it wouldn’t have been a big deal. All I needed to do was typing a few paragraphs and posting them.
I didn’t.
I didn’t because I didn’t want to lie. And partly because I didn’t want to something that would make me look foolish.
All I wanted to do was searching a truthful way to be happy and say it loud. So I decided to wait for 2 years until I could arrive on an honest conclusion.
I’ve been pondering since then, questioning myself, observing others, and learning from others’ lives, and from that of my own – how can we remain happy?
Not just happy.
Happy in spite of all the awful events which occur, failures that shatter our self-esteem, and unbearable anguish we suffer from.
Just one thing which can be a cure to all the bad things in life.
A simple solution which can put an end to our confusions. Something we don’t need to learn or try hard to inculcate in our lives but rather accept.
And did I find one? Yes.
I found what I’ve been searching for – that infallible way which can keep us happy. Forever.
The Answer
We all have developed some customs while growing up, without knowing whether they’re right for us or not.
Evaluating our worth based on what we have, comparing ourselves to others, setting raised milestones – all this soon turns into a standard of happiness we set for ourselves.
When we fulfill those standards, we think we’re happy. When we don’t, we drown in despair.
But happiness is more than that. There’s more to it than the big things we plan. In fact, that’s what happiness is about – finding joys in little things.
This is what I’ve learned.
If you can stay happy because of the little reasons which happen to you each day, then you can be happy forever.
That’s your answer.
The sooner you believe it, happiness won’t be somewhere in a nebulous future for you. You’ll find it right in front of you, as something that’s always present with you.
Something’s wrong
We see happiness as something we can only find in big things. After all, that’s what we’ve been doing.
You become happy when you get your first job learn to be independent.
You become happy when you buy a new home or possession you had always wanted.
You become happy when you marry the person you love or when you become a parent.
You become happy when you become capable of fulfilling your parent’s wishes.
Sure these are all beautiful things. Each one of them.
Still there’s something which goes unnoticed and you don’t even realize.
You can been happier than you already are if you quit waiting for ‘big things’ to happen in life to be happy.
How we see happiness
If you pay close to whatever makes you happy, you’ll realize most of it has something to do with events.
Most of our happiness in life comes from a set of events that happen. Doesn’t matter if they’re your milestones or goals.
Becoming a millionaire, owning your favorite car, starting a business – all these are big things you can strive for treating them as measures of happiness.
Yet, what you might fail to understand that while you chase those big things, you miss out the most beautiful things in life.
Life isn’t only in what you want and work for.
It brings tiny bits of happiness to you each day, but you get so busy following your desires that you fail to notice their existence.
You get plenty of reasons to be happy each day, in several forms, but you fail to recognize them.
You ignore those little moments thinking that they aren’t worth your attention or smile.
It’s not completely your fault either.
You’ve been taught by the world to only become happy when there’s something big happening. Otherwise life’s nothing more than normal.
What you forget is that everything you think of source of happiness has its limits.
Things don’t make you happy.
The joy of victory fades sooner than you can imagine.
Relationships sure bring lasting happiness, though which isn’t constant.
That happiness lasts for some time, you can feel it, but not have it anymore as it fails to delight you.
But when you learn to cherish the little things in life, you actually learn to be happy and teach yourself to be grateful.
You celebrate every moment. When you make this a habit, you stay happy forever.
Your next step
To be honest, I don’t wish to behave like an expert, but after living my stories and experiences amid all the happenings in life, the only way I’ve found to be happy forever is to never miss a chance to smile.
Once you begin to appreciate all that happens around you and admire the details of life, you’ll fall in love with it again. I did.
You won’t ask for more to be happy. You won’t be dissatisfied with what you have. Yet, you’ll be grateful.
Look around, life’s good, and it has given you enough reasons to be happy. Don’t miss them out. Fall in love with those little trickles of joys.
I’ve found happiness
I can’t tell whether this is an infallible secret to happiness, but I realized it earlier than most people do.
I’ve taught myself to be happy before sharing this thought with you. I might write or not write about several things, but I’m learning more about life each day. This is one of those things.
After all, I don’t need to spend a lifetime analyzing monks and millionaires, or wait until my hair turn grey, only to tell what I have learned.
What I’ve said is just a perspective – you can believe it, dismiss it or make it a way of living.
That’s up to you to decide.
I’ve fallen in love with little things in life. I admire them each day and I exploit every moment I get.
And after doing this for years, all I can say is that if you can learn to be happy about the little things in life and appreciate them regardless of what life does to you, you can stay happy forever.
I did it, and I don’t regret a moment of it.
I gaze at the stars when I’m alone, I intentionally take different ways to reach my home, I feel the drops of rain touching me, I breathe in the cool breeze of evenings, I feel grateful for what my work teaches me, I sleep peacefully after a day of hard-work and capture the time spent with family in my heart.
There’s a lot I had been missing. But now I don’t. I know where my happiness is – right in front of me – in the little things.
When I started appreciating the little things in life, my pains lowered.
Maybe doing this doesn’t make life easier, but it surely makes me understand that I don’t need much to be happy.
You’re no different.
You have a plenty of reasons to smile – but for that, you’ll need to notice those reasons by appreciate them.
When you’ll do that, life will seem a lot more beautiful than you thought it is.
Live a lifetime in moments
Life happens not in years or days but in moments.
Each second you live is your moment. A new instance of time. You can either treat it like ordinary or value it.
Here’s some fair advice – live a lifetime in moments. Value what life’s showering on you each day.
When you’re in the moment, be in it. Live it fully. Drink it. Make it unforgettable.
When you live in moments, you live more than you can. You live a thousand years in those moments, after which you don’t feel like asking for a longer life.
You may skip this part
I don’t have a herd of friends.
To be precise, I can count them on fingers of my right hand. I love them all.
Then there are some others, whom I can count on the rest of my fingers and toes. They matter as much as the prior ones.
Though, there’s one thing they have in common – they think I’m foolish.
The reason is simple. Quite ordinary. I bring back the memories which have passed years ago, with the exact details, phrases and situations.
They can’t recall much.
When I narrate something from the past, they think I’m lying.
It’s just that I remember life that has passed by, better than they do. It’s still the same.
The good part of all this?
I lived.
The how’s and why’s don’t matter as much as the fact that I remember. Some memories blurred, some sharp, but I do remember.
I’m glad that I remember.
Those memories are within me, reminding me of the time that I’ve lived, with all the happiness I wished to have.
I can tell stories about them, share them with others, write about them, or just recall everything in silence and smile.
This is the joy of living in moments
The moments you actually live don’t leave you. They linger around you.
If you’ve actually lived your life, you’ll have a lot of those moments. A lot of beautiful moments from the past you can recall and live on when there won’t be much happening.
And maybe, when you’ll look back at the life you’ve lived, there will be millions of those memories resembling a sky filled with stars.
You can then sit in silence and feel good about the life you’ve lived without any regrets and without any unfulfilled wishes while being thankful to all that has happened.
I’m glad that I remember.
I wish to do more of those things that I can remember.
I’ve found an infallible way to be happy by learning to appreciate the little things in life.
Loved what you just read? Leave a comment. That makes me happy.