#happiness

I don't know what your destiny will be, but one thing I know: the only ones among you who will be really happy are those who have sought and found how to serve. ↗

— Albert Schweitzer

#happiness #service #destiny

But maybe happiness isn't in the choosing. Maybe it's in the fiction, in the pretending: that wherever we have ended up is where we intended to be all along. ↗

— Lauren Oliver

#pretending #fiction

I am not proud, but I am happy; and happiness blinds, I think, more than pride. ↗

— Alexandre Dumas

#pride #pride

Do not look for happiness outside yourself. The awakened seek happiness inside. ↗

— Peter Deunov

#enlightenment #happiness #inner-peace #self-fulfillment #wisdom

I believe that being happy is the only important thing. Happiness. Simple as a glass of chocolate or torturous as the heart. Bitter. Sweet. Alive. ↗

— Joanne Harris

#happiness #joanne-harris #torture

Now and then it's good to pause in our pursuit of happiness and just be happy. ↗

— Guillaume Apollinaire

#good #happiness #happy #just #just be

Zakath stared at the floor. 'I suddenly feel very helpless,' he admitted, 'and I don't like the feeling. I've been rather effectively dethroned, you know. This morning I was the Emperor of the largest nation on earth; this afternoon, I'm going to be a vagabond.' You might find it refreshing,' Silk told him lightly. Shut up, Kheldar,' Zakath said almost absently. He looked back at Polgara. 'You know something rather peculiar?' What's that?' Even if I hadn't given my word, I'd still have to go to Kell. It's almost like a compulsion. I feel as if I'm being driven, and my driver is a blindfolded girl who's hardly more than a child.' There are rewards,' she told him. Such as what?' Who knows? Happiness, perhaps.' He laughed ironically. 'Happiness has never been a driving ambition of mine, Lady Polgara, not for a long time now.' You may have to accept it anyway,' She smiled. 'We aren't allowed to choose our rewards any more than we are our tasks. Those decisions are made for us. ↗

— David Eddings

#fantasy #happiness #ambition

Maybe happiness too is a metaphor invented on a day of boredom ↗

— Gustave Flaubert

#boredom

Tomorrow will never call to ask your opinion; you don't control it. Stop allowing today's possibilities to be robbed by tomorrow's insecurities. ↗

— Steve Maraboli

#happiness #insecurities #inspirational #life #motivational

If one has failed to develop curiosity and interest in the early years, it is a good idea to acquire them now, before it is too late to improve the quality of life. To do so is fairly easy in principle, but more difficult in practice. Yet it is sure worth trying. The first step is to develop the habit of doing whatever needs to be done with concentrated attention, with skill rather than inertia. Even the most routine tasks, like washing dishes, dressing, or mowing the lawn become more rewarding if we approach them with the care it would take to make a work of art. The next step is to transfer some psychic energy each day from tasks that we don’t like doing, or from passive leisure, into something we never did before, or something we enjoy doing but don’t do often enough because it seems too much trouble. There are literally millions of potentially interesting things in the world to see, to do, to learn about. But they don’t become actually interesting until we devote attention to them. ↗

— Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

#interest #art