rtew1981's blog, page 1

Last login: 3 months agoRtew1981: Robert is a 27 year old single guy from San Diego, California, USA.; Likes 11 pages, 1 video, 1 photo • 1 fan • Received 2 reviews; Member since May 24, 2007

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Ending Sadness |: Apr 25, 11:19pm 1 review love, freedom, happiness, living, sadness
http://livelifehappy.com/?p=314; Great article on ending sadness. Who would have thought it were this simple?

American Dream is Over |: Apr 9, 10:43pm 1 review politics, dream, obama, american, federal-reserve
http://livelifehappy.com/?p=296; The american dream is over! Screw Bush. This Country is going into a recession because of the Federal Reserve!

Happiness |: Apr 9, 10:41pm 1 review self-improvement, love, self-help, happiness, live-life
http://livelifehappy.com/?p=299; Great article on the secret to happiness. Short and concise! A must read!

Apr 9, 10:34pm: H A P P I N E S S

Happiness is the great elusive quality in your life, isn't it??? That's why you

pursue it so diligently. That's why you're reading this... Happiness is our holy grail... So

why, if it's that important, do we keep hitting one dead end after another? I have heard so
many people say that, "I'll be happy when I get my new promotion." Or, "I'll be happy when I
can finally take my vacation." The list goes on and on...

This thinking is dangerous b/c it presupposes that happiness is a "response" to having or
doing something that you don't yet have or do. Much of life is driven on the stimulus-response
relatinoship. Here's an example. "Stimulus" is when a dog barks at you & bares his teeth.
"Response" is when your heart beats faster, your palms get sweaty, and you prepare to run. In
the same way, most people believe our happiness can only be the response to a certain stimulus.
People think that an expensive car--a stimulus--will lead to a response of happiness. If they
have a great paying job--the proper stimulus, they believe--then their response will be
happiness.

But what if the opposite is true? What if happiness is the stimulus and the response is
whatever life brings from that happiness? Think about it. When we are happy, we have closer
friends and more loving relationships, simply because people want to be around us. When we are
happy, we naturally take better care of our bodies instead of abusing them. When we are happy,
we tend to have more success in our work. People who behave in successful ways are people who
already feel good about themselves.

I want you to try a test that I once gave myself Finish the question, "I'll be happy when..."
And don't just limit yourself to one answer. Go through everything you think will make you
happy--from money to health to family to career.

When I did the test, I wrote down nearly 50 things. I decided I would be happy when I was out
of debt, when I had gotten a new job, when I bought a condo, and on and on. It was basically a
dream list. I included some very personal things that were related to spirituallity as well...

Then, over the next few weeks, I went back to the list and asked myself, "Do I really need to
do this one thing to be genuinely happy?" The answer, of course, was always no, and I'd
eliminate that particular item from the list. Needless to say, by the time I was done, I had
eliminated everything.

I thought for a while about what I had learned from that exercise, and clearly, one thing
emerged--the fewer the "I'll-be-happy-when" items on my list meant the easier it would be to be
happier. In the end, I whittled my list down to one item: every day that I'm above this ground
is a great day. For me, every day I was above ground (i.e., not dead) meant that I was happy.

As a result, I began a lot of great days in a row. My happiness wasn't dependent on my having
something or having achieved something. My happiness was based on the fact that I was alive,
and it didn't matter what the circumstances were. And it was because I chose happiness that
other good fortune began coming to me. I didn't let anxiety, disappointment, and frustration
get in the way of my life.

Truly happy people spend most of their time on today. Why? B/c today is all we have.
Yesterday is gone and tomorrow never comes. Yes, there are lessons to be learned from the past.
Yes, tomorrow gives us hope to endure. But happiness can be found only when we focus on today.
Otherwise, when the future does arrive, it becomes our new present, which means we, once again,
start obsessing about a new future. It's a vicious circle... As one ancient philosopher once
put it, "Today is the first day of the rest of your life."

May this day be your best day ever. Cheers!

--Robert | "Hold the vision, create the reality."

livelifehappy.com [livelifehappy.com]