The happiness factor
“You can be happy or you can be unhappy. It’s just according to the way you look at things.”
- Walt Disney
Perspective is everything when it comes to our level of happiness in life. Happiness is a subjective term too. People define it differently. Hopefully, everyone can agree that happiness is a feeling. Hopefully, it’s a feeling we all want to experience more often. For most of us, we experience happiness in doses. A satisfying meal. A great conversation. An unexpected windfall. Unfortunately, our happiness can easily get interrupted by the slightest of inconveniences like malfunctioning technology or crappy weather. We can choose to get annoyed or frustrated, or we can choose to not let the inconvenience disrupt our happiness.
Happiness is absolutely a choice. There will always be situations that go beyond minor inconveniences where happiness is the wrong mood for the moment, but when it comes to traffic jams and cancelled plans, it helps to have a healthier perspective on things. Something I learned from the “Don’t Sweat The Small Stuff” movement back when I was a young adult is that I was allowing small stuff like long lines and rude people ruin my mood. I remember thinking how I was intentionally doing this to myself. What a waste of my time and energy!
