Happiness Is A Choice

I talked last week about happiness being a serious problem. When you start to take a closer look at happiness, you realize that unhappiness is easy and happiness takes work! The notion the happiness must be worked at comes as news to a lot of people. Most people assume that happiness is a feeling and that this feeling comes as a result of good things happening to us.  (We therefore have little control over how happy we are, the thinking goes, because we cannot control how we feel or what happens to us) NOT!!!


That is a false statement. Happiness is largely, not entirely, determined by us through hard work and wisdom. Every worthwhile thing in life is attained through hard work. Happiness is not an exception.  Happiness is a battled to be waged, not a feeling to be awaited.

I have fought this battle.  I've read books, processed pain, dealt with my "issues" and came to a clear understanding that I had GREAT personal responsibility regarding my own happiness. Years ago as I was working on my happiness level, I came across a book, "Happiness is a Choice." The Author  suggested to me all those years ago, that happiness was truly my choice. That if I was unhappy, I was choosing it.
He suggested 7 things to do, to choose happiness. The book went on to say that if I were to do these 7 things consistently for 3 to 6 months, I would surely find that I was experiencing more happiness than I was currently feeling.

It wasn't enough at that time for me to read that book and think a few new thoughts...I was determined to turn my sorrow into joy, my unhappiness into happiness. So here's what I did. I took the 7 steps in that little book, read about them, sought to understand them and then typed them (yes, I said typed) up on a little piece of paper to put on my desk at work. If you've experienced times of unhappiness, you know like me, that you can't old on to good thoughts for long periods of time. Our negative thought life beats us up constantly. Your thought life directly influences your feelings, so it was important to me, to be faced with these 7 steps all day long.

I am going to address 2 of those seven steps today...
This is what I typed:

Happiness Is a Choice!

Choose each day to do these things and look back in 3 to 6 months and see if you just haven't found the road back to happiness.

1. Commit your life to the purpose of glorifying God.
Where ever you are today in your faith journey, I want to encourage you to look at this first step, even if you need to say, "God as I understand Him." To submit to a higher power is a life altering way to live. This was not a difficult step for me. Glorifying God sounds like a pretty overwhelming task but the way I see it, to glorify God, is to surrender to His power over your life and gladly receive it.  I began to see each day as a gift, because if my purpose was to glorify God with my life, then I must have something important to do each day.

2. Get rid of grudges daily.
Unforgiveness, bitterness and grudges, robs you of more joy than anything else in your life. Forgiveness is a MUST to experience happiness. It has been said that that unforgiveness is the # 1 greatest determinant of our mental health. Unforgiveness breeds resentment, bitterness and judgment. Walls go up, not with those that we are angry with, but everyone around us. Unforgiveness gets generalized and spreads throughout all our relationships; it doesn't just affect one or some. Make it a practice to keep short accounts. Verbalize "I am a forgiving person."  Each day go back though your day and let go of what every is necessary.


Those are two of the very important 7 steps that I took to find my way back to happiness. Ponder these two steps this week as we continue to be on the pursuit of happiness. Next week, we will look at two more.

Always encouraging you,
Letha