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Thursday, July 11, 2013

Thankful Thursday: Let's get happy

For my summer vacation read I picked up the best selling book
The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin.
I felt a little silly a first reading it.
I am not much for the "self-helpy" books, but this had a different undertone to it.
It wasn't all woe is me. 
Instead I found myself totally relating to Gretchen's explaining of 
her quest to be more happy, not less miserable.
Now mind you I am not but only half way into the book, and I still have lots of reading to do.

But, after spending some amazing quality time with my 
family last week a certain thing about happiness occurred to me.
My Dad, Step Mom, and sisters all flocked to the lake.
Some of my sisters even brought some friends.
It was a week of lots of girls, 8 of them to be exact.
Eight women under one roof...
It was like a sorority house with a 30 year age gap.

When there are that many personalities in one cabin, 
and mother nature is playing the "rain on your vacation" game,
some truths about people start to really come out.

The passages I was reading kept making more and more sense.
Not everyone's happiness looks the same.
For me, in that moment, my happiness was being surrounded by 
my parents, my sisters, the serenity of the lake, the little 
details that I was capturing on our adventures and the big laughs we left along the way.
I found myself grabbing onto every single moment and then found 
myself dealing with a bit of sorrow when that moment was over.
I never want it to end.
While some found the greatest happiness in a drive alone through the country,
others found the most joy in the uncertainty of what tomorrow would bring. 

My point is this.
It is impossible to look at someone and know what makes them happy.
All we can do is be grateful that there are so many different kinds of people that make the 
huge happy place go round.
One can not define the terms of happiness,
but only recognize it when they see it.
So see it.  Look for it.  Share it.  Emote it.
The happier you are, the happier those around you will become.

Be Grateful & Inspire

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