Shortcuts to Happiness. Part xx

As I continue to walk my path in life trying to be happier more loving to all around me, its sometimes hard to sustain that feeling of happiness that is so essential to me now.
Hardships and occurrences may happen in life, which is hard to cope with and life does not always take the path that I feel I want or expect, but one thing that I have found that helps me to sustain the ‘happiness feeling’ is ‘Gratitude.’

Gratitude is a personality characteristic that people clearly display when they become happier. Although a lot of work and effort has gone into their individual journeys toward increased clarity and comfort, most find that a sustained experience of happiness goes beyond their dreams.

When we are happy, we are truly grateful. The reverse also holds true. When we are grateful we are truly happy. In fact, sometimes I call gratitude the sweetest way to embrace happiness when I forget. We can cut through all the misery by turning our attention to being grateful.

In spite of all the catastrophes that might occur we can find little and larger ways to be thankful for what we have. Gratitude then becomes the shortest of shortcuts to happiness. Before proceeding further, we would do well to deal first with what might feel like a natural human propensity to resist gratitude and appreciation.

Most of us have probably been raised with the ‘should’ of politeness. Perhaps we have said thank you so often without sincere appreciation, so that the words stand devoid of any real feeling and meaning. How often have I heard my parents and others tell me to say thank you as a child, when I didn’t want to or see the need to, so my need to say thank you now is sometimes polluted by the memories of insincere gratitude. Gratitude was a pretense, almost a punishment for not being allowed to express my true feelings.

Not only do we resist feeling appreciation, we refrain from expressing it for strategic and tactical reasons. If I say “Thank you” do we now owe something in return? If we express gratitude for help does that diminish us? Suppression of feelings for reasons of self-protection is an illusion. We gain nothing by our silence and our stoicism. We do not cheat the world with our lack of gratitude we only cheat ourselves.

To simply mouth the expression of gratitude is what has been the problem since childhood with the obligatory “thank you.” Words! They did not always encourage us to do it. A smile begins to do it. A hug amplifies the feeling. A helping hand or meaningful support makes gratitude even more tangible. In no way do our actions minimize the silent gratitude we might feel while viewing a sunset or watching a sky full of eagles migrate to a foreign land. To be grateful means not only to delight, enjoy and appreciate, but also to recognize simultaneously the blessing and the wonder of an experience. In such moments there is only happiness.