quotations about Happiness
The happiest people are the people with the best attitudes, not the best lives.
BOB LONSBERRY
A Various Language
Success is identical with happiness only on condition that we have aimed at and attained those things in life which are really worthwhile, and--if success is to be complete--the most worthwhile. Any success which does not result in happiness, in some one of its varied forms, for self or for others, is a sham.
FRANK CHAPMAN SHARP
Success: A Course in Moral Instruction
If you wish to be happy, think not of what is to come nor of that which you have no control over but rather of the now and of that which you are able to change.
CHRISTOPHER PAOLINI
Brisingr
Happy are those men who live without ambition, distrust, or disguise.
WELLINS CALCOTT
Thoughts Moral and Divine
Happiness is an imaginary condition, formerly attributed by the living to the dead, now usually attributed by adults to children, and by children to adults.
THOMAS SZASZ
The Second Sin
Happiness is a condition of mind not a result of circumstances.
JOHN LUBBOCK
attributed, Character and Conduct: A Book of Helpful Thoughts by Great Writers of Past and Present Ages
A man may be happy anywhere that knows how to be contented.
WELLINS CALCOTT
Thoughts Moral and Divine
There are many teachers who assert positions, which logically lead to pessimism. Some declare that happiness is a will-o-the-wisp ever deluding the eager grasp, and it is better not to attempt the impossible. Others see life lived under a leaden sky and on a sodden earth. They agree that to some, and under some conditions, happiness of a kind would be possible, but it is so rare a chance that it is not worth counting on ourselves becoming the fortunate exceptions. There is not enough happiness to go round. Others assert that the sure way to lose happiness is to seek it. If you aim at it at all, it must be indirectly. You may have it at the back of your mind, but you must not have your eye on it. Still another objection to the pursuit of happiness is that it is selfish. Yet everybody would admit that a world of happy human beings is an ideal worth while. How is this even to begin to be possible, if nobody is ever to try to be happy himself?
HUGH BLACK
Happiness
Who can tell where happiness may come, or where, though an expected guest, it may never show its face?
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE
The Marble Faun
It seems the more we seek happiness, the more it eludes us. But despite our collective failure to achieve bliss, we continue to find its quest appealing, and the people who peddle pleasure make a lot of money off of it.
SUSIE MEISTER
"The Business of Happiness Is Booming but We're Still Miserable", The Observer, June 25, 2018
In my life I have found two things of priceless worth - learning and loving. Nothing else - not fame, not power, not achievement for its own sake - can possible have the same lasting value. For when your life is over, if you can say "I have learned" and "I have loved," you will also be able to say "I have been happy."
ARTHUR C. CLARKE
Rama II
Very much less than we think does our happiness depend upon that which is external to us. If there is no heaven within, all the externalities of an outward heaven would be insufficient to produce happiness.
REUEN THOMAS
Thoughts for the Thoughtful
Unconditional happiness is the one that is innate in human beings, that is permanent, that has no end, which exists when we reach a stage of acceptance of everything that surrounds us.
LUIS ALVES
Happiness Is Possible: Towards Unconditional Happiness
The only true happiness lies in knowing who you are ... and making peace with it.
LAURELL K. HAMILTON
Narcissus in Chains
A somewhat depressing lesson that we learn from life is that there is no guaranteed sure-fire formula for happiness.
MICHAEL W. EYSENCK
Happiness: Facts and Myths
Happiness: We rarely feel it.
I would buy it, beg it, steal it,
Pay in coins of dripping blood
For this one transcendent good.
AMY LOWELL
"Happiness", Sword Blades and Poppy Seed
Happiness is NOT a constant state. As humans we experience and grow through a variety of emotions. The expectation that we should be happy all the time will leave anyone with an expectation hangover.
CHRISTINE HASSLER
"13 Incredibly Smart Tips To Be Happier From Mental Health Experts", BuzzFeed, July 9, 2015
Do you know what I think happiness is really? Lookin' forward.
JOHN HARTLEY MANNERS
Happiness and Other Plays
The problem with the concept of happiness is trying to make it do enough without making it do too much. If we define it narrowly as a certain type of feeling or physiological state, then we can, in principle, measure it objectively, but it is too trivial a thing to be the foundation of all public life and private decisions. On the other hand, if we define it broadly as something like 'the elements of a good life', then it is so broad as to beg the question, and certainly too broad to be measured in national statistics. Yet we intuitively feel that there is something called happiness, something unitary but not trivial, concrete enough to strive for yet broad enough to be worth striving for.
DANIEL NETTLE
Happiness: The Science Behind Your Smile
Happiness is a tiger in your tank and a pussycat in your back seat.
JOHNNY CARSON
Happiness Is a Dry Martini