Popular quotes about Happiness! Wisdom and inspiration are here! | page 75
False happiness renders men stern and proud, and that happiness is never communicated. True happiness renders them kind and sensible, and that happiness is always shared.
Baron de MontesquieuReal happiness is not dependent on external things. The pond is fed from within. The kind of happiness that stays with you is the happiness that springs from inward thoughts and emotions. You must cultivate your mind if you wish to achieve enduring happiness.
William Lyon PhelpsWe have lived through the era when happiness was a warm puppy, and the era when happiness was a dry martini, and now we have come to the era when happiness is 'knowing what your uterus looks like'.
Nora EphronOur notions about happiness entrap us. We forget that they are just ideas. Our idea of happiness can prevent us from actually being happy. We fail to see the opportunity for joy that is right in front of us when we are caught in a belief that happiness should take a particular form.
Nhat HanhThe only way to find happiness is to understand that happiness is not out there. It's in here. And happiness is not next week. It's now.
Marshall GoldsmithA look filled with understanding, an accepting smile, a loving word, a meal shared in warmth and awareness are the things which create happiness in the present moment. By nourishing awareness in the present moment, you can avoid causing suffering to yourself and those around you. The way you look at others, your smile, and your small acts of caring can create happiness. True happiness does not depend on wealth or fame.
Nhat HanhHappiness is a state of mind. With physical comforts if your mind is still in a state of confusion and agitation, it is not happiness. Happiness means calmness of mind.
Dalai LamaNo mockery in this world ever sounds to me so hollow as that of being told to cultivate happiness. What does such advice mean? Happiness is not a potato, to be planted in mould, and tilled with manure. Happiness is a glory shining far down upon us out of Heaven. She is a divine dew which the soul, on certain of its summer mornings, feels dropping upon it from the amaranth bloom and golden fruitage of Paradise.
Charlotte BronteActions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness; wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness. By happiness is intended pleasure and the absence of pain.
John Stuart MillIf you do not feel deserving of happiness, consciously or subconsciously, or if you have accepted the idea that happiness is somehow wrong or cannot last, you will not respond appropriately when happiness comes knocking at your door in the form of romantic love. No matter how much you may have waited and cried, you will not welcome love when it arrives-you will find a way to sabotage it. What a challenge to resist this temptation! What an opportunity for true spiritual growth and transformation-to defy your negative feelings and honor the gift that life offers you!
Nathaniel BrandenDon't be too much concerned about money, because that is the greatest distraction against happiness. And the irony of ironies is that people think they will be happy when they have money. Money has nothing to do with happiness. If you are happy and you have money, you can use it for happiness. If you are unhappy and you have money, you will use that money for more unhappiness. Because money is simply a neutral force.
RajneeshWe must learn that to enjoy happiness we must conscientiously and continuously seek to spread happiness. Selfishness is suicidal to happiness.
B. C. ForbesAttaining lasting happiness requires that we enjoy the journey on our way toward a destination we deem valuable. Happiness is not about making it to the peak of the mountain nor is it about climbing aimlessly around the mountain; happiness is the experience of climbing toward the peak.
Tal Ben-ShaharMost people keep waiting on happiness, putting off happiness until they're successful or until they achieve some goal, which means we limit both happiness and success. That formula doesn't work.
Shawn AchorIs it not in the struggle to obtain knowledge that happiness exists? I am very ignorant, consequently the conditions of happiness are mine.
Fridtjof NansenSince every man desires happiness, it is evidently no small matter whether he conceives of happiness in terms of work or of enjoyment.
Irving BabbittAs one needs happiness so have I needed love; that is the deepest need of the human spirit. And as I love you utterly, so have you now become the whole world of my spirit. It is beside and beyond anything that you can ever do for me; it lies in what you are, dear love - to me so infinitely lovely that to be near you, to see you, hear you, is now the only happiness, the only life, I know.
Rockwell KentHappiness is the only sanction of life; where happiness fails, existence remains a mad and lamentable experiment.
George SantayanaIf we strive for happiness, it's going to be elusive because things constantly happen with human beings that disrupt that happiness. But if you focus on euphoros, the Greek word for "the bearer of goodness," you will be inhabited by the divine source of life.
Agapi StassinopoulosHappiness depends on your mindset and attitude. Happiness is in your mind, not in the circumstance.
Roy T. BennettThe single most important principle I ever discovered is this: the goal or purpose of the Christian is precisely the pursuit of happiness - in God. The reason for this is that there is no greater way to glorify God than to find in Him the happiness that my soul so desperately craves.
Sam StormsNobody whom this war has touched will ever be happy again in quite the same way. But it will be a better happiness, I think, little sister - a happiness we've earned.
Lucy Maud MontgomeryI believe all suffering is caused by ignorance. People inflict pain on others in the selfish pursuit of their happiness or satisfaction. Yet true happiness comes from a sense of inner peace and contentment, which in turn must be achieved through the cultivation of altruism, of love and compassion and elimination of ignorance, selfishness and greed.
Dalai LamaI did some more soul searching. I asked myself, "What do I want more than happiness?" and there was only one answer - the only thing that trumps happiness is love. Not the kind of love we are normally taught about, but the kind of unconditional love that is a deep inner state which doesn't depend on any person, situation or a romantic partner. That's how I define Love for No Reason: it's an inner state of love.
Marci ShimoffIf [God] has made it a law in the nature of man to pursue his own happiness, He has left him free in the choice of place as well as mode, and we may safely call on the whole body of English jurists to produce the map on which nature has traced for each individual the geographical line which she forbids him to cross in pursuit of happiness.
Thomas JeffersonIf sensuality be our only happiness we ought to envy the brutes, for instinct is a surer, shorter, safer guide to such happiness than reason.
Charles Caleb ColtonChildren at once accept joy and happiness with quick familiarity, being themselves naturally all happiness and joy.
Victor HugoHappiness and joy comes to you when it moves through you. There is no other pathway--and that's the miracle. You will have a number of opportunities in the days just ahead to be a vehicle of happiness and joy for another. Step right into that. Be the source of that. As you bring others to a smile, so, too, will you bring yourself. The method is foolproof.
Neale Donald WalschI do not like the idea of happiness - it is too momentary - I would say that I was always busy and interested in something - interest has more meaning to me than the idea of happiness.
Georgia O'KeeffeLove is the felt experience of connection to another being. An economist says 'more for you is less for me.' But the lover knows that more of you is more for me too. If you love somebody their happiness is your happiness. Their pain is your pain. Your sense of self expands to include other beings. This shift of consciousness is universal in everybody, 99% and 1%.
Charles EisensteinMost people are searching for happiness. They're looking for it. They're trying to find it in someone or something outside of themselves. That's a fundamental mistake. Happiness is something that you are, and it comes from the way you think.
Wayne DyerThe happiness which God designs for his higher creatures is the happiness of being freely, voluntarily united to him.
C. S. LewisI've worked with farmers in Zimbabwe who've lost their lands. I've worked with people in Venezuela, under threat of kidnappings, whose external world is unstable. But they have very strong social connections with their family and friends. And as a result, they're able to maintain a greater level of happiness and optimism than I've seen from bankers, consultants, or salespeople who are on the road all the time, who follow jobs separated from their families, and, as a result, find themselves missing out on the happiness that comes from those very connections that they severed.
Shawn AchorNow if there is any gift of the gods to men, it is reasonable that happiness should be god-given, and most surely god-given of all human things inasmuch as it is the best. But this question would perhaps be more appropriate to another inquiry; happiness seems, however, even if it is not god-sent but comes as a result of virtue and some process of learning and training, to be among the most god-like things; for that which is the prize and end of virtue seems to be the best thing in the world, and something god-like and blessed.
AristotleThat is truth. In that truth, there is real happiness. And there is nothing that could disturb that happiness.
Radhanath SwamiThe first person who ever told me that happiness was work was this manic-depressive artist I knew when I was in my 20s. I was like, 'What are you talking about? Happiness just happens. That's even the root of that word. How could it be work?
Ariel GoreDublin ... is not only the capital of a nation, but the capital of an idea. The idea of Irishness is not universally beloved. Some people mock it, some hate it, some fear it. On the whole, though, I think it fair to say, the world interprets it chiefly as a particular kind of happiness, a happiness sometimes boozy and violent, but essentially innocent: and this ineradicable spirit of merriment informs the Dublin genius to this day.
Jan MorrisThe fact is always obvious much too late, but the most singular difference between happiness and joy is that happiness is a solid and joy a liquid.
J. D. SalingerOn Christmas morning, our joy or our happiness can be at a very high level, not because of our anticipation of what we might receive but, rather, in anticipation of watching our loved ones open our gifts to them. In fact, if we're not careful, we can fail to register sufficient excitement and joy upon opening the gifts we receive from others. We must remember that they are happiest at that time and to give them top billing, to stretch their happiness to its full length.
Earl NightingaleSelf-knowledge is no guarantee of happiness, but it is on the side of happiness and can supply the courage to fight for it.
Simone de BeauvoirJust as eunuchs will never know aesthetics as applied to the selection of beautiful women, so neither will pure rationalists ever know ethics, nor will they ever succeed in defining happiness, for happiness is a thing that is lived and felt, not a thing that is reasoned or defined.
MiguelThere is no one way to Happiness. Happiness is the way! It's inside your head FIRST and everyplace else second
Jeffrey GitomerPeace comes from within. Do not seek it without. It can be argued that peace and happiness comes from the subjective internalised perspective of realizing things could be worse and being grateful they aren't. The alternative view that peace and happiness comes from the objective external perspective of having more and better things than at present, while important for growth, can be a never-ending source of jealousy, dissatisfaction and disappointment. A balance of the two, where people are grateful for what they have while striving for more seems the best blended perspective.
Gautama BuddhaHappiness of heart can never be measured out and bundled up, it's intangible. We keep running after it, grasping for it, and the heat of our running so seldom brings it closer. But now and then there may be a moment. We look at something and know it is good and beautiful. Those moments are happiness.
Gladys TaberCultivate your gardenย Do not depend upon teachers to educate you ย follow your own bent, pursue your curiosity bravely, express yourself, make your own harmonyย In the end, education, like happiness, is individual, and must come to us from life and from ourselves. There is no way; each pilgrim must make his own path. "Happiness," said Chamfort, "is not easily won; it is hard to find it in ourselves, and impossible to find it elsewhere.
Will Durant