Happy

Let those thoughts go A big part of living more frequently in the landscape of happiness is to recognise that thoughts come… and thoughts go.  We don’t actually have to attempt to control or manage our thoughts. I know there’s a lot of ‘human performance’ modalities that suggest we need to do exactly that – jump […]

Happiness is not a pursuit – it is a perspective That pretty much sums up this new approach to living my life in a greater and more frequent state of grace. And at times, I forget that happiness is a perspective.  At times, more often than I would like, I get caught up in how […]

How do you treat yourself? I’ve discovered that our personal levels of happiness have a lot to do with our relationship to ourselves.  Which begs the question: What is your relationship like to yourself?  Are you good to you?  Are you kind?  Are you generous and supportive? Or are you your own worst enemy?  I […]

It’s been intriguing to notice how I’ve managed my happiness levels, or more broadly my entire emotional state, lately.  Especially when external events are not going to order, or as I would like them to in any given way. We’ve so long been trained into thinking that external events and circumstances determine our happiness.  It’s a direct […]

I have been learning a lot, primarily about myself, as I’ve been exploring happiness over the last 4 months.  It’s so fascinating when you set yourself up on an experiment like this, the opportunity to learn things, and uncomfortable things, about yourself is huge. I haven’t always liked what I’ve learned about me.  It’s a […]

What happens when happiness, and hope, elude you? The suicide of Charlotte Dawson, a well known Australian television presenter, one month ago, affected me.  One month ago exactly, Charlotte was only moments away from taking her own life. I cannot imagine the desolation she must have been feeling.  The complete absence of hope. I never […]

It’s not about always being happy When I embarked onto this exploration deep into the landscape of happiness, I had this rather naïve idea (I realise now) that it was about always being happy.  Never having a down day, or a melancholy moment. Not so. I’ve discovered that the full spectrum of emotions — including those […]

The river of happiness exists. I know because I’m in it a lot these days. Not all the time, but much of the time. It carries me along in its current.  I don’t have to do anything to stay in it.  Except if I forget, I can look down and see the water, or dangle […]

There’s nothing to do to get happy I first heard this fairly early in my experiments with happy.  This whole “nothing to do – everything to be” concept. It blew the top of my head off. I have become so accustomed to doing, doing, doing, busy, busy, busy. It’s a badge of honour these days […]

Happiness is free I heard an analogy recently about water and happiness.  That we’ve all been sold a bill of goods that happiness is like bottled water – the freshest, most thirst quenching and delicious water can only be found in a bottle, produced by a specialist company who sells it to us at a […]