The Art of being happy.

LizzieMaine said:

Unless you're poor, sick and can't afford catastrophic medical care. My greatest fear is coming down with something that would be cureable if I had money. Dealing with the things I have to deal with now is bad enough.

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Health issues beyond my control are not within the scope of my discussion. I agree with you. For example, if I get hit by a car iI am not going to jump up and declare,"wow this must be my lucky day", and just go about my business.

The stress of health issues alone, regardless of the ability to pay, is enough to test anyone's patience, tolerance or faith for that matter. I, however, do not believe the issue of payment in itself will shorten anyone's life span because it is stressful.

Perhaps one of the keys to true happiness is realizing that life is now.

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absolutely HoosierDaddy.

I could sit for hours and discuss this. I think it is so timely with this last year we have gone thru or am going thru.
Look at the wealthy movie stars and such that commit suicide.
I do completely understand Lizzie though and the ability to have medical care is a concern but... When I was taking care of my father with cancer I met what one would consider a very wealthy man in the hospital where my dad was on his very last days. This man told me he had been a CEO of a company and his wife had taken ill for years. They had gone thru all the insurance, all the retirement and now was on medicaid. It can happen that no matter how much you plan, life plans you.
I keep saying it over and over. None of us will take a cracker with us.
The other day I was talking with an older lady who stated she graduated from college in about 1957. I asked her if it was better then. Without even pausing she said, "we were the same." I asked her what she meant by that and she stated everyone was on the same level mostly.
I seriously think we have been cheated big time. We have completely bought into the idea of names on ours butts, shoes, shirts etc.
People chose friendship out of morals or out of wittiness or out of kindness. The banker could sit with the mechanic. I really believe this. We now get our ways, rules, everything from what is chunked at us from tv or the internet.
I just know at anytime the poor girl in the trailer could become the wealthiest, the wealthiest man could lose it all in one night.
I personally just flat do not care.I so want just simple friends. I don't want to see their resume, I don't care what they drive or where they live. Do they treat their children sweetly, do they care about their fellow man, do they try to keep what they have clean and do the best they can. I know there are still people like that. That is who I want to meet in this new state I am in. Solid people, not thieves, not liars, word is everything and they can be trusted with my belongings, with my family, I could leave them to watch things and know they would carry it thru. They would help me when I was down and I would try to help them when they were down. How many of you truly have people around you like that. Then you are very wealthy indeed if you do.

Well I've got a practical application on poor for you.

Do you decide to feed your kid because they cut your hours down and walk in the rain for 5 miles to work because you can't afford the gas, or even bus fare Or do you give your kid something crappy and not very nutritious because you've got pneumonia.

My kid's a happy, healthy boy, thank God, but I've been faced with this in the past more then once. It is NOT a happy place to be or terribly inspiring. It just sucks.

Money doesn't buy happiness, but it sure helps in making sure the needs are met to be happy.

Foofoogal said:

I personally just flat do not care.I so want just simple friends. I don't want to see their resume, I don't care what they drive or where they live. Do they treat their children sweetly, do they care about their fellow man, do they try to keep what they have clean and do the best they can. I know there are still people like that. That is who I want to meet in this new state I am in. Solid people, not thieves, not liars, word is everything and they can be trusted with my belongings, with my family, I could leave them to watch things and know they would carry it thru. They would help me when I was down and I would try to help them when they were down. How many of you truly have people around you like that. Then you are very wealthy indeed if you do.

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VERY well put, Foofoogal. I agree with this wholeheartedly. The individuals you discuss above are the true gold of humanity. :eusa_clap

After a point, more money and more stuff won't make you happier. A lot of people have become very unhappy going into debt to buy stuff they couldn't pay for and didn't need. Those people don't need more money, they need to look elsewhere--in friendship, family, work, themselves, for instance--for happiness.

Heard an interview of a guy on the radio.. He was an artist of some kind I think or craftsman.. Can't remember what it was.. Ironworks or something.

Anyway he said "I love what I do.. An old man told me when I was a kid, son, find a business doing what you love.. If you can work in what you love to do or make, you'll never work a day in your life."

That's powerful.

Kalidasa:

Listen to the Exhortation of the Dawn!
Look to this Day!
For it is Life, the very Life of Life.
In its brief course lie all the
Verities and Realities of your Existence.
The Bliss of Growth,
The Glory of Action,
The Splendor of Beauty;
For Yesterday is but a Dream,
And To-morrow is only a Vision;
But To-day well lived makes
Every Yesterday a Dream of Happiness,
And every Tomorrow a Vision of Hope.
Look well therefore to this Day!
Such is the Salutation of the Dawn!

Point is...there may always be complications sneaking in to thwart "happiness"...usually when it's least expected...or when the timing just surely isn't right. In everyone's life...no matter the setting. Life is not perfect..a bed of roses. Friends...family...or children may not turn out as you might expect...or hope for. Finances can come and go. I think that a sense of happiness begins with me. Not accepting that I'm doomed for headaches and heartache...worry...but the idea that I do have much to be thankful for. May sound somewhat cliche....but just where should we really look for happiness? How many of us proclaim that we just haven't found it yet...or it hasn't found us. If things don't work out as planned or desired...many tend to determine that happiness must be,at the least,never lasting..or worse case a fraud...but perhaps it is/was fleeting because we tend to look or are led to the wrong place....again...
HD

I understand completely what 59LARK is talking about. My own father died suddenly at 52. He worked hard as a labourer his whole life,and spent his last years building boats, which he hated. He often talked about the fact that if he had the opportunity he would have wanted to be a marine biologist. As an idealistic youngster I thought that he had given up and lacked courage and really believed that anything was possible if he only tried. He died in the same house he had lived in his entire life, never, ever having "gotten ahead".

Later, i came to feel gratitude for the fact that he stuck with his family and work that was unfulfilling and unchallenging to make our lives better. I finally saw that his sacrifice took a kind of courage that i didn't understand.I was determined that I would make his sacrifices worth it by making sure my life was better. In some ways it is, but here i am, 42 and no closer to doing something i love than he was. Chances are , I never will. So I am doing exactly what my parents did..spending every spare nickel i can get my hands on to try to make my kids lives are better, and making sure THEY have the opportunities I did not. And ..just like I did to my father, they have started to ask me why i don't just quit my job and do something else? And I tell them that they should reach for Their dreams..

So I have made a choice. maybe someday change will come. maybe it won't. But I have decided that I will practice the art of learning to be content. Because i really believe that just taking a deep breath sometimes and finding contentment in being exactly where you are is where real happiness is. FooFoogal is right, we never know what is around the corner.And what if i put all my energy into getting whatever it is that i think will make me happy,and then lose it all the next day? I will have missed what is right in front of me. I think the biggest lie we have been fed is that we are all entitled somehow to this state of perfect bliss.We spend money we don't have to try and get it.Mothers and fathers are leaving families behind because the "magic" has gone out of the relationship.Thousand of books have already been written about it, plus oodles of money spent on therapy to try and find it. I am choosing contentment instead , because i don't want to look back on my life and feel that I have spend so much of my life trying to get happy that i made myself miserable.

maybe someday more of my dreams will come true. But for now, i will be content with the ones that already have.

Outstanding post in my view
Quite simply put...olive bleu..!
HD

Olive Bleu, that was simply wonderful. Thank you.

thank you Olive Bleu. I also applaud you for your sacrifices to your family.
Honoring our parents goes a very long way and you seeing how your father did indeed sacrifice also is a very nice thing.

olive bleu said:

So I have made a choice. maybe someday change will come. maybe it won't. But I have decided that I will practice the art of learning to be content. Because i really believe that just taking a deep breath sometimes and finding contentment in being exactly where you are is where real happiness is. FooFoogal is right, we never know what is around the corner.And what if i put all my energy into getting whatever it is that i think will make me happy,and then lose it all the next day? I will have missed what is right in front of me. I think the biggest lie we have been fed is that we are all entitled somehow to this state of perfect bliss.We spend money we don't have to try and get it.Mothers and fathers are leaving families behind because the "magic" has gone out of the relationship.Thousand of books have already been written about it, plus oodles of money spent on therapy to try and find it. I am choosing contentment instead , because i don't want to look back on my life and feel that I have spend so much of my life trying to get happy that i made myself miserable.

maybe someday more of my dreams will come true. But for now, i will be content with the ones that already have.

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Well said!

Of course, sometimes we need to leave where we are and what we're doing because it's untenable. There's no simple test for knowing when that's right--we have to think carefully, knowing that, as you said, we have no reason to expect perfect bliss.

more or less

I have been very pleased with the response to this thread, it seems that i have touched on a subject that connects to a lot of others on this subject. I have come to the realization that i really do enjoy what i do for a living, its more my frustation at running a small business in this econonmy and i need to be organized and more efficent and thats the problem. I Love my family, my workshop even as messy as it is , my kingdom. I just felt my mortality and my age and felt that i should have achieved more, but my road has been different that others. I spoke to my elderly mother and she admitted that even when they were my age, they struggled weekly to pay the bills and did without most things that we today take for granted. I dont have very many friends anymore, and the weight of my daughers asbergers condition caused me to be sad, and retrospective . The fact that i am very blessed with much and i enjoy my trade and i have the opportunity to do better if i can just get my act together where so many do have this chance. Have a lovely day everyone. 59Lark.

Try Dennis Prager's "Happiness is a Serious Problem." Fascinating. (Desmond Morris has a similar book, "The Nature of Happiness.")

How about a gratitude list?

59Lark said:

Dear Loungers ; i appreciate all the advice, and will take some of it, and i have heard the flying with eagles one. The little world that i live in, sometimes overwhelms me. The narrow field of vision, true this has been a really hard year for business. The game is meaner and for real this year, but maybe forty is a hard time for men, thats why so many run and off and play stupid. I just think that i felt that after 20 years it would be easier and its not. But i do have a good home, two nice kids and a good wife, the grass is always greener over the hill, but its usually over a septic tank. We take so much for granted today, but i have been told by my mother that my folks were still struggling to keep their farm when they were in their forties if it makes me feel better. The year always comes with several struggles including the asberger that daughter has, and we are starting to go to parent support group this week , hoping that will give us some insight to help live with this disibility. I have decided to work hard and do the best that i can do and hope and pray for the best. 59LARK.fftopic: fftopic:

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I've heard that around 40 is when many people change careers. However, if you love what you do and you are just having a bad year, you may not want to change.

Who knows, maybe it's a "mid-life crisis" triggered by going to your father's grave. My father died at 63 from cancer. that was over 10 years ago now, and I still miss him so much.

My family has had a couple of hard years. I was laid off from my job right before the economy tanked. I spent 9 months looking for a job while I saw the economy sliding into the train wreck it is today. However, I had a way to stop the hemorrhaging of my families finances. I'm in the National Guard, so I volunteered to get deployed to Iraq. I've only seen my family for four weeks since 08 September 2008. Two at Christmas and two in February after I got out of training. I'll finally be home again around March 2010.

So, I'm paying the bills, but I can't say I'm happy where I'm at in my life. But, I feel like I'm contributing to my family's future. I'm changing my profession when I get back to the states and will just keep on moving forward. I never thought I would be in the military at 41, let alone fighting in some desert somewhere.

Just try to be positive and remember that there is always a light at the end of the tunnel. Look for the positives in life. Make a "gratitude list" of everything you are thankful for (I need to do this too because I've been really down too lately).

My daughter turned one in June, and I just saw her walk on Skype tonight. I missed her birth and 1st birthday but she points to the computer screen and can say "daddy." My son wants to ride some train with me when I come home on leave! When I left he was pointing and saying "dat." Now, he can tell me he wants to ride a train. It's amazing!

If you got a roof over your head and food on the table, that is one place to start on a gratitude list. Shoot, I'm going to go and make mine right now.

What a great post,SlyGI....
Makes one stop and think.
Wish you the best,Sir...and thank you!
HD

SlyGI
Thank you greatly for your service to me and my whole family which is huge.
Freedom is never Free.
Hope you get to come home for good soon.

The gratitude list for me is the same thing as the spiritual song, "count your many blessings, name them one by one."
My mother sang this song always and I cannot tell you how that one song has been able to get me thru. As long as one is breathing, there is always hope. I love this scripture BTW.
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For to him that is joined to all the living there is hope: for a living dog is better than a dead lion. Eccl.9:4.
So true.

SlyGi

Thank you for your post. Funny how life happens when you are making other plans. When I served I was told I would never become rich. I found that to be untrue. The riches I received have been in the form of my freedoms and the gratitude of others for my contribution.

For me the trick is wanting what I have; not having what I want.....within reason, of course.

Once I have accomplished that I simply say:

God grant me the serenity
To accept the things I cannot change
The courage to change the things I can
And the wisdom to know the difference. Reinhold Niebuh

A common theme of the FL is the re-capping of others' lives. From our view we can see how our ancestors lived and have intimate details of what happened when and how.

The big picture view is almost always brighter than when we're standing knee-deep in ugly. I remind myself of how time shifts the meaning of things so I don't panic and take a "I can't wait to see how this turns out." I will eventually be one of those entries in someone's geneaology and intend for it to have a happy ending.