Ray's Daily

Ray’s Daily

December 19, 2018

https://rays-daily.com/

Happiness depends upon ourselves.

Aristotle

I felt ill yesterday but did not let it get me down. I am at the point where I don’t have time to waste on unhappiness. I have learned that if I give in to feeling sorry for myself the only result is my being unhappy while making others unhappy as well.

Minor setbacks and infirmities are part of life and our happiness does need to be diminished when they occur. After all we are still here living our lives and have much to be grateful for.

The Top 10 Things to Remember About Happiness

By Diana Robinson

Almost all of us want to be happy. Being happy is not a skill taught in school. If we are lucky, our parents taught us about happiness, either by example or by shared wisdom. For the rest of us, there are some important things to remember about happiness, and the art of being happy.

1. It is OK to want to be happy. – It is not unduly selfish, or materialistic, or self-centered. Wanting to be happy is normal.
2. To pursue happiness is an inalienable right – to be happy is not. – Some people seem to believe that they have a right to be happy, that other people should make them happy, that when they are not happy they have a right to complain about it and that complaining will cause them to be happy. All three premises are false.
3. No one owes you happiness. – Assuming you are an adult, your happiness is not anyone else’s problem. If you are a person who spreads happiness, then others will probably want to contribute to your happiness. This is their choice, not your right.
4. Happiness comes from attitude, from within. – We become happy when we cultivate an attitude of appreciation and gratitude, when we focus on the good stuff. One way to do this is by keeping a regular gratitude journal. This gets us in the habit of looking for what is good in our lives, and when we focus on that we are likely to be happy.
5. Owning more things does not make you happy. – Advertisers would like to make us believe that we can buy happiness, but we cannot buy happiness by buying more things.
6. Happiness is more a process than it is a goal. – When I get… when I reach… when I am… we may think that happiness is something that will come, or will happen, one day. Eventually, we will probably find that happiness is the journey, and that if we focus only on the destination we will never get there.
7. Talking about unhappiness does not make you happy. – It is true that we all need to vent at times. The purpose of venting is to express our dissatisfaction with something so that we can move on. If we keep our mental attic filled with unhappy stuff, there will be no room for anything else. We need to get rid of it so as to make room for the happy thoughts to move in.
8. Happiness is more often accompanied by accomplishments than by compliments. – Certainly it is nice to be appreciated, and we all need to receive encouraging words from others. But they need to be based on fact. It is when we have worked and achieved that we can know that the words ring true, and can really feel good about them and ourselves.
9. Memories of happy times can be stored up for retrieval during the bad times. – Very few of us will never feel unhappy, will never fall into ‘the slough of despondence.’ A major help then is to remember the times when we were happy, and the fact that we have those memories ‘in the bank.’
10. Happiness comes from sharing happiness. – There are few joys as complete as those that involve bringing joy to someone else. Happiness defies the laws of economics in that it is not something that we have less of when we give it away. It is something that grows greater for the giver as it is given. The more you give, the more you have.

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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 that has been opened for us.

Helen Keller

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A Sunday school teacher was discussing the Ten Commandments with her five and six year olds. After explaining the commandment to “honor thy father and thy mother,” she asked, “Is there a commandment that teaches us how to treat our brothers and sisters?” Without missing a beat one little boy answered, “Thou shall not kill.”

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It is possible to own too much.  A man with one watch knows what time it is.  A man with two watches is never absolutely sure.

~~~

Memorial Day weekend was coming up, and the nursery school teacher took the opportunity to tell her class about patriotism.”We live in a great country,” she said. “One of the things we should be happy about is that, in this country, we are all free.”

One little boy came walking up to her from the back of the room. He stood with his hands on his hips and said. . . . “I’m not free. I’m four.”

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Blessed are those who can give without remembering and take without forgetting.

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When we moved cross-country, my wife and I decided to drive both of our cars. Nathan, our eight-year-old, worriedly asked, “How will we keep from getting separated?”

“We’ll drive slowly so that one car can follow the other,” I reassured him. “Yeah, but what if we DO get separated?” he persisted.

“Well, then I guess we’ll never see each other again,” I quipped. “Okay,” he said. “I’m riding with Mom.”

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“Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go.”

Oscar Wilde

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A father noticed that his son was spending way too much time playing computer games.  In an effort to motivate the boy into focusing more attention on his schoolwork, the father said to his son, “When Abe Lincoln was your age, he was studying books by the light of the fireplace.”

The son replied, “When Lincoln was your age, he was The President of The United States.”

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“For centuries, people thought the moon was made of green cheese. Then the astronauts found that the moon is really a big hard rock. That’s what happens to cheese when you leave it out.” -Age 6

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Cry. Forgive. Learn. Move on. Let your tears water the seeds of your future happiness.

Steve Maraboli

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Ray Mitchell

Indianapolis, Indiana

Management is not responsible for duplicates from previous dailies. The editor is somewhat senile.

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