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If you miss the first bus, catch the next one
If you miss an opportunity or mess one up, don’t give up, just catch the next “bus.” There will always be other opportunities, no matter how we’ve messed up in the past. We don’t just get one shot—life isn’t that chintzy. Other opportunities will be available, though they will most likely take a different form than the previous one.
Happiness tip excerpted from the new book How to Be Happy NOW…Even if Things Aren’t Going Your Way available on Amazon and Amazon UK. © 2013 Sara Weston
Happiness Tip: Bring your full attention to what you do
With the advent of email, cellphones, text messaging, the Internet, etc. there are numerous ways for our focus to be interrupted. But when our attention is diffused, we don’t approach our interactions with people or our work with the same level of energy and intent that we do when we are focused. When we approach people in a scattered way, we don’t hear, understand and ultimately relate to them as well. When we approach work without our full attention, our work is not as clear and crisp, it takes longer to do and is not as satisfying to do as when we are focused. Even watching a movie while multi-tasking diminishes the experience. A movie takes you on an emotional journey, but when you switch your attention to texts, emails and phone conversations, your attention is leached out and the movie isn’t as funny, poignant or thrilling. In other words, when you don’t bring your attention to what you do, you miss all the good stuff. When you bring your full attention to work, play and relationships, they’re more intense, enjoyable and satisfying.
Happiness tip excerpted from the new book How to Be Happy NOW…Even if Things Aren’t Going Your Way available on Amazon and Amazon UK. © 2013 Sara Weston
Happiness Tip: Don’t let the fear of offending someone trap you in a draining situation.
Third entry in an ongoing series in which movie scenes are used to illustrate happiness concepts and tips.
One tip in How to Be Happy NOW is Don’t let the fear of offending someone trap you in a draining situation, excerpted here: If someone is dumping all over you, you don’t need to stick around because you feel like you will hurt that person’s feelings by leaving quickly. This may seem incredibly obvious, yet many people will allow a coworker to dump all their garbage on them, or allow a creepy man to hit on them because they don’t want to hurt his feelings. It’s okay to hurt the feelings of someone who is draining you or dumping on you! If you want to be graceful in your escape, you can have a few good excuses in your back pocket, such as “I was just on my way to the restroom” or “I have a meeting that I need to get to,” but don’t take on someone’s bad energy because you think it is the polite or compassionate thing to do.
In the movie The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, the reporter Mikael Blomkvist has figured out that Martin Vanger is a serial killer. Mikael goes to Martin’s house to snoop around and find more evidence. Martin sees him outside his house and asks him in for a drink. Mikael goes into the house and then is forced into the room where Martin kills his victims. As he plans to kill him, Martin says:
Can I ask you something?….You knew something was wrong – you even knew what it was – but you came back into the house. Did I force you? Did I grab you and drag you in? I just offered you a drink. (pause)
You’d never think the fear of offending could be stronger than the fear of pain – but you know what? It is. They always come willingly.
Of course, this is an extreme example—most of us would not go into a serial killer’s house for the sake of not offending him! Far more “threatening” are coworkers, salespeople and certain friends or relatives who just want to dump their garbage on us, and we let them because we don’t want to offend them. Each of us knows the difference between a friend who needs our support and a kind ear and a person who is ranting, complaining and dumping their toxicity on us. It is okay to offend someone who is using us or draining us. Get out of there.
Happiness tip excerpted from the new book How to Be Happy NOW…Even if Things Aren’t Going Your Way available on Amazon and Amazon UK. © 2013 Sara Weston
Cards & Posters Now Available!
Available now—cards and posters created from the original artwork and photographs in the book How to Be Happy NOW! Check out the Cards & Posters page to find:
Scottie Gal Greeting Cards—4 different “Scottie Gal” cards to choose from. Each is 5″ x 7″ and printed on ultra-heavyweight (120 lb.) card stock with a gloss finish.
Scottie Gal Posters—12″ x 12″ posters printed on archival heavyweight matte paper. They look great framed and clustered together.
Nature Cards—14 different cards that feature original photos from the book. Each card is 7″ x 5″ and is printed on ultra-heavyweight gloss card stock.
Happiness Tip: Simplify Your Life
Simplify your life so you have time to do the things you really love and that make you happy. Remove unnecessary and dull activities and relationships from your life. Also, look at the things you do out of obligation that you dislike and realistically assess whether you need to do them or not.
Excerpted from the new book How to Be Happy NOW…Even if Things Aren’t Going Your Way available on Amazon and Amazon UK. © 2013 Sara Weston
Free Book Excerpt
Download a FREE excerpt of the new book How to Be Happy NOW…Even If Things Aren’t Going Your Way! To download, right click on the book cover image below, and select “Save Link As…” or “Download Linked File As…”. A dialogue box will open. Select the location where you want to save the book, then click “Save”.
For iPad or iPhone, touch the book cover image below to open the eBook. A new window will open with the eBook in it. Touch the screen and an “Open in iBooks” buttons will appear. Touch the “Open in iBooks” button and the file will open in iBooks and be saved there.
Text, photographs and illustrations copyright © 2013 Sara Weston
Core Practice: Choose to Be Happy
It’s a personal choice to be happy. Everyone has a high, happy side and a low, bored or depressed side, and which side you live in is determined by the choices you make. The choices that lead to happiness are the ones that challenge us, awaken us, and keep us balanced. They are the choices to meditate and work-out when you’d rather watch TV, to be mindful when you’d rather obsess on something negative, to work on your career when it seems easier to just hang out where you are, and also the choice to relax and unwind when you know you need that but are nonetheless tempted to stay plugged in. The choices that lead to happiness are the ones that take care of the things that are yours to take care of and, just as importantly, the choices to not take on things that are not your responsibility. On a daily basis, we are presented with numerous choices, both simple and complex, that lead us to either more happiness or less. When you become the person who makes the higher choice by default, you will absolutely feel happier. The good news is that meditation increases your powers of discrimination and will, so it’s easier to both discern the higher choice and follow it.
Of course, many of the physical circumstances of our lives are beyond our control, but even in these situations there is a choice to be happy. When you get caught in a major traffic delay, you can bemoan your fate which magnifies the misery of the situation, or you can keep on hand great audio books, podcasts and music to entertain yourself while you are trapped in your car. In more dire situations, like finding out your partner cheated on you or that you have been diagnosed with cancer, there is still an opportunity to be happy. Stick with me for a moment on this one. Sometimes the most painful situations in life can act as a catalyst to finally get us to really stop thought, go into our inner light and experience that we are not who we think we are—to see that we’re made of light and are eternal. This is the happiest of all experiences. When everything is going our way we tend to not be very introspective, but in truly unpleasant times, in our disillusionment with how we thought our life would go, there is an opening to experience something deeper. So even amidst the crappiest situation, there is a choice to indulge in the difficulties of your life or an option to go deeper into the quiet and deeper into your soul where true happiness resides. True happiness isn’t about everything working out your way. It’s really about being in touch with your inner light.
Excerpted from the new book How to Be Happy NOW…Even if Things Aren’t Going Your Way available on Amazon and Amazon UK. © 2013 Sara Weston
When people are rude or mean to you, it’s usually not personal, but instead a reflection of their own mind state
When the cashier at the grocery store is rude to you or someone at work tries to belittle your work, most times their behavior has nothing to do with you, but instead is a reflection of their own state of mind. That cashier is rude to everyone and that coworker tries to make everyone feel small. It helps to know this so we don’t take it personally and let it affect our mood.
Happiness tip excerpted from the new book How to Be Happy NOW…Even if Things Aren’t Going Your Way. © 2013 Sara Weston
Your Future Is NOT Set
Many folks believe that their future is set—that they are destined to continue on the track they are currently on. And to some extent, they are right. Most people will continue to follow their current karma. (When I use karma here, I don’t mean the pop culture understanding of karma where if I steal a car today, my car will be stolen in short order. Rather I’m referring to the esoteric meaning of karma, which is that your karma is the sum total of all your thoughts and actions. It is your current state of mind, which reflects the way you react to people and situations in life.)
In general, people don’t do much to change their karma (their state of mind), so their lives do follow the track they’re already on. But it doesn’t have to be this way—you can absolutely change your karma through the use of your free will. It is entirely possible to change your state of mind, change the way you react to situations, and change “you”!
This concept of using your free will to change your karma is illustrated perfectly in the movie Minority Report. In the movie there is an experimental “Pre-crime” police unit, which apprehends criminals before they commit their crimes. The unit uses three gifted humans called “pre-cogs” who see crimes before they happen. By monitoring these pre-cogs’ brains, the police know the criminal’s name and when the crime will occur, so they arrive at the scene of the crime before the crime is committed and arrest the future criminal.
The benefit of this method is, of course, that the crime is prevented. The downside is that it doesn’t allow for the possibility that the criminal may change his or her mind and not commit the crime. In fact, one of the more gifted pre-cogs, Agatha, occasionally sees a different future in which the crime is not committed. This seeing, which is divergent from the other two pre-cogs, is called the “minority report”. It represents the criminal’s use of free will to make a different choice and change his destiny. The two pre-cogs who see the “majority report” are seeing the criminal’s karma or default state of mind. Most of the time, all three pre-cogs see the same outcome. This is because most people don’t diverge from their karma. But occasionally, Agatha sees a different future, the minority report, which is when a person uses their free will to break away from their karma.
We all have the ability to use our free will to change our karma, to change our state of mind, our choices, and thus, our future. If you’ve always been bad at finances, you can use your will to make different choices and get your finances in order. If in the past you’ve had calamitous relationships, you can change your state of mind to choose healthier relationships. If you’ve always had an unhappy state of mind, you can use your free will to take steps to change your mind state to a happy one. Your future is not set!
p.s. You can strengthen your will by meditating on your navel center, which is the center of willpower. It’s best to learn to meditate from someone advanced in meditation, however, if that is not available to you, meditation instruction is included in the appendix of my book, How to Be Happy NOW, Even If Things Aren’t Going Your Way.
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