Many people look at happiness as a blanket or jacket that they wear on the outside to show the world. It covers up the pain, hurt and sadness that is really in that person’s heart, but it projects the “right” image to the outside world. But true happiness is held inside your heart. It is a warmth that you don’t show to others by choice instead, it is a feeling that you exude. It is honest and true and cannot be taken away from you by anyone else. It is the choice that you have made to be happy and to seek happiness. Those who understand it will see it, appreciate it and even strive to emulate it. Those who have chosen to be angry, mean or unhappy will never believe nor embrace it. Create and cultivate your own happiness and know that it will remain with you unless you choose to give it up.
This is so very true and so beautifully expressed, as you are so gifted at doing, Kathy. I can’t resist sharing a little poem about happiness I’ve had for years and treasure as one of my favorites, most appropriate on this very snowy day in Michigan where our outside temperature is -3 degrees below zero and everything outside is white, white, white!!!!
You have to believe in happiness
“You have to believe in happiness,
Or happiness never comes.
I know that a bird chirps none the less
When all that he finds is crumbs.
You have to believe the buds will blow,
Believe in the grass in the days of snow.
Ah, that’s the reason a bird can sing,
On his darkest day he believes in Spring.
You have to believe in happiness—
It isn’t an outward thing.
The Spring never makes the song, I guess,
As much as the song the Spring.
Aye, many a heart could find content
If it saw the joy on the road it went,
The joy ahead when it had to grieve,
For the joy is there—but you have to believe.”
—Douglas Malloch (1877–1938)
Thank you, Pam, for your very kind words as always! I am happy to pass along the poem that you shared for everyone to enjoy.
Well said and very true. We are the only ones who control our happiness.
Thank you, Amy!