Happiness

"Happiness, free, for everyone, and let no one be forgotten!"

"Happiness is possible only in a relationship with a partner. Imagine that some fellow who has lived his life as a singer goes to an uninhabited island and sings as loudly as possible. If there is no one there to hear him, he will not be happy. To realize that we exist for the sake of others is the great achievement that changes our lives. When we realize that our life is not ours alone but is meant to be for the sake of the other, we begin to follow a path different from the one we were on. Just as singing to yourself will not make you happy, there is no joy without a partner. Even the smallest and most trivial thing can bring you happiness when you do it for another."

"Kindness of heart is always happy."

"Man’s consummation consists in the attainment of his last end, which is perfect beatitude or happiness, and this consists in the vision of God, as was demonstrated above. The beatific vision entails immutability in the intellect and will. As regards the intellect, its questing ceases when at last it comes to the first cause, in which all truth can be known. The will’s variability ceases, too; for, when it reaches its last end, in which is contained the fullness of all goodness, it finds nothing further to be desired. The will is subject to change because it craves what it does not possess. Clearly, therefore, the final consummation of man consists in perfect repose or unchangeableness as regards both intellect and will."

"Money might not buy happiness, but it can buy the things that buy happiness."

"Happiness depends on conditions being perceived as positive; inner peace does not."

"The Buddha taught that even your happiness is dukkha -a Pali word meaning "suffering" or "unsatisfactoriness." It is inseparable from its opposite. This means that your happiness and unhappiness are in fact one. Only the illusion of time separates them. This is not being negative. It is simply recognizing the nature of things, so that you don't pursue an illusion for the rest of your life. p. 117"

"The whole advertising industry and consumer society would collapse if people became enlightened and no longer sought to find their identity through things. The more you seek happiness in this way, the more it will elude you. p. 118"

"I have learned to offer no resistance to what is; I have learned to allow the present moment to be and to accept the impermanent nature of all things and conditions. Thus have I found peace. To offer no resistance to life is to be in a state of grace, ease, and lightness. This state is then no longer dependent upon things being in a certain way, good or bad. It seems almost paradoxical, yet when your inner dependency on form is gone, the general conditions of your life, the outer forms, tend to improve greatly. Things, people, or conditions that you thought you needed for your happiness now come to you with no struggle or effort on your part, and you are free to enjoy and appreciate them - while they last. All those things, of course, will still pass away, cycles will come and go, but with dependency gone there is no fear of loss anymore. Life flows with ease. The happiness that is derived from some secondary source is never very deep. It is only a pale reflection of the joy of Being, the vibrant peace that you find within as you enter the state of nonresistance. Being takes you beyond the polar opposites of the mind and frees you from dependency on form. Even if everything were to collapse and crumble all around you, you would still feel a deep inner core of peace. You may not be happy, but you will be at peace."

"Many people live with a tormentor in their head that continuously attacks and punishes them and drains them of vital energy. It is the cause of untold misery and unhappiness, as well as of disease. The good news is that you can free yourself from your mind. This is the only true liberation. You can take the first step right now. Start listening to the voice in your head as often as you can. Pay particular attention to any repetitive thought patterns, those old gramophone records that have been playing in your head perhaps for many years. This is what I mean by "watching the thinker," which is another way of saying: listen to the voice in your head, be there as the witnessing presence. When you listen to that voice, listen to it impartially. That is to say, do not judge. Do not judge or condemn what you hear, for doing so would mean that the same voice has come in again through the back door. You'll soon realize: there is the voice, and here I am listening to it, watching it. This I am realization, this sense of your own presence, is not a thought. It arises from beyond the mind."

"The primary cause of unhappiness is never the situation but your thoughts about it. Be aware of the thoughts you are thinking. Separate them from the situation, which is always neutral. There is the situation or the fact, and here are my thoughts about it. Life isn't as serious as the mind makes it out to be."

"People believe themselves to be dependent on what happens to them for their happiness. They don't realize that what happens is the most unstable thing in the universe."

"Все счастливые семьи похожи друг на друга, каждая несчастливая семья несчастлива по-своему."

"Be it even over our bleaching bones the truth will triumph! We will blaze the trail for it. It will conquer! Under all the severe blows of fate, I shall be happy as in the best days of my youth! Because, my friends, the highest human happiness is not the exploitation of the present but the preparation of the future."

"O terque quaterque beati."

"Clap along if you feel like a room without a roof Because I'm happy Clap along if you feel like happiness is the truth Because I'm happy Clap along if you know what happiness is to you Because I'm happy Clap along if you feel like that's what you wanna do"

"One thing I am convinced more and more is true and that is this: the only way to be truly happy is to make others happy. When you realize that and take advantage of the fact, everything is made perfect."

"Only a man who lives not in time but in the present is happy."

"All the things I really like to do are either immoral, illegal, or fattening."

"You seem, Antiphon, to imagine that happiness consists in luxury and extravagance. But my belief is that to have no wants is divine; to have as few as possible comes next to the divine; and as that which is divine is supreme, so that which approaches nearest to its nature is nearest to the supreme."

"True happiness ne'er entered at an eye; True happiness resides in things unseen."

"Happiness is a good flow of life."

"Hold him alone truly fortunate who has ended his life in happy well-being."

"'Twas a jolly old pedagogue, long ago, Tall and slender, and sallow and dry; His form was bent, and his gait was slow, His long thin hair was white as snow, But a wonderful twinkle shone in his eye. And he sang every night as he went to bed, "Let us be happy down here below; The living should live, though the dead be dead," Said the jolly old pedagogue long ago."

"Real happiness is cheap enough, yet how dearly we pay for its counterfeit."

"La massima felicita divisa nel maggior numero."

"Priestly was the first (unless it was Beccaria) who taught my lips to pronounce this sacred truth—that the greatest happiness of the greatest number is the foundation of morals and legislation."

"Quid enim est melius quam memoria recte factorum, et libertate contentum negligere humana?"

"Oh, Mirth and Innocence! Oh, Milk and Water! Ye happy mixtures of more happy days!"

"all who joy would win Must share it,—Happiness was born a twin."

"There comes For ever something between us and what We deem our happiness."

"Quid datur a divis felici optatius hora?"

"The message from the hedge-leaves, Heed it, whoso thou art; Under lowly eaves Lives the happy heart."

"In animi securitate vitam beatam ponimus."

"Le bonheur semble fait pour être partagé."

"If solid happiness we prize, Within our breast this jewel lies, And they are fools who roam; The world has nothing to bestow, From our own selves our bliss must flow, And that dear hut,—our home."

"Who is the happiest of men? He who values the merits of others, And in their pleasure takes joy, even as though t'were his own."

"Das beste Glück, des Lebens schönste Kraft Ermattet endlich."

"Now happiness consists in activity: such is the constitution of our nature: it is a running stream, and not a stagnant pool."

"The loss of wealth is loss of dirt, As sages in all times assert; The happy man's without a shirt."

"And there is ev'n a happiness That makes the heart afraid."

"Fuge magna, licet sub paupere tecto Reges et regum vita procurrere amicos."

"Non possidentem multa vocaveris Recte beatum; rectius occupat Nomen beati, qui Deorum Muneribus sapienter uti, Duramque callet pauperiem pati, Pejusque leto flagitium timet."

"That Action is best which procures the greatest Happiness for the greatest Numbers; and that worst, which, in like manner, occasions misery."

"Upon the road to Romany It's stay, friend, stay! There's lots o' love and lots o' time To linger on the way; Poppies for the twilight, Roses for the noon, It's happy goes as lucky goes, To Romany in June."

"Happiness consists in the multiplicity of agreeable consciousness."

"Ducimus autem Hos quoque felices, qui ferre incommoda vitæ, Nec jactare jugum vita didicere magistra."

"On n'est jamais si heureux, ni si malheureux, qu'on se l'imagine."

"A sound Mind in a sound Body, is a short but full description of a happy State in this World."

"Happiness, to some elation; Is to others, mere stagnation."