November 19, 2014 by Sara Weston

Happiness Tip: Take a hike

TakeAHike Get out in nature, away from people, at least once a month, as this will slow down the activity of the mind and clear you out. You’ll feel better and be able to see things about your life more clearly.

Similarly, get out of town for a few nights every few months or so. Everything will be brighter and clearer when you return home. Many times, the solution to a problem will become clear and sometimes a problem will cease to even exist because it no longer feels like a problem.

Excerpted from the book How to Be Happy NOW…Even if Things Aren’t Going Your Way, available on Amazon, Amazon UK and Amazon DE. © 2013 – 2014 Sara Weston. A FREE excerpt of the book is available here.

October 25, 2014 by Sara Weston

You Are Not Your Mind

Your mind is an amazing and essential tool, but it is not who you truly are. All the thoughts and ideas that run through your mind feel very close, like “you,” so it can certainly feel like your mind defines who you are—but if you put your mind on “Pause” for a moment and stop your thoughts, you will find that there is still a presence there. You find that you are still there even when your mind is not thinking.

What is that presence that is still there when the mind is silent? I can tell you that it is your true self, the light and consciousness that make up everything and everyone. But it’s not very transformative to read that. What’s powerful is to experience that eternality for yourself! What’s transformative is to start meditating and slowing down the mind so you can find out for yourself that who you truly are is beyond the mind and the body, is eternal and is good. If you need meditation instruction, check out the free eBook on How to Meditate.

© 2014 Sara Weston. Sara is the author of he book How to Be Happy NOW…Even if Things Aren’t Going Your Way, available on Amazon, Amazon UK and Amazon DE. A FREE excerpt of the book is available here.

October 12, 2014 by Sara Weston

Core Practice: Be Honest With Yourself

Additional Tips2 Honesty with yourself is essential to being happy. You have to check that what you are doing in your life is working for you. Sometimes we have such a strong idea of how our life should be and what will make us happy that we don’t want to face that these ideas aren’t right for us anymore. We may have grown out of them or they may have never been our ideas and dreams in the first place, but instead were imposed by family or society and accepted by us as ours. Other times we have invested so much time and energy to get our life to where it is, that we don’t want to face the fact that it is no longer working. When we honestly recognize that something is no longer working, then from this place of recognition we can begin to change it.

Being honest about what is working applies to all aspects of your life, big and small—whether it’s recognizing that you’re bored with your job and you need to mix it up, or that constantly checking your phone diffuses your focus and you need to dial it down. When you recognize what is not working in your life and change it, despite past ideas of what you think will make you happy, you will be a happier person.

Note that you don’t have to necessarily share or discuss your internal honesty with others. In fact, if we had to share all our internal insights with others, we’d never be completely honest with ourselves! What matters most is that you are simply honest with yourself.

September 12, 2014 by Sara Weston

Be Empirical About Your Energy and Moods

yellow flwr-pola Notice which people, situations or activities energize or drain you. Notice how you feel before interactions and then how you feel afterwards. Take note of the patterns so you can become consciously aware of the situations and activities that give you energy or that drain you. By being truly aware of what is draining and what is empowering, we can make better decisions about how and where we spend our time.

Tip excerpted from the book How to Be Happy NOW…Even if Things Aren’t Going Your Way, available on Amazon, Amazon UK and Amazon DE. © 2013 – 2014 Sara Weston. A FREE excerpt of the book is available here.

August 27, 2014 by Sara Weston

Stop Caring What Other People Think of You

MedGalWalking People perceiving you as rich, beautiful, lucky, tough or smart will not make you happy, yet you wouldn’t know this if you observed how much time and energy people spend trying to get other people to think they are those things. If people think you have got it made, it won’t make you happy. Just look at celebrities—many people admire them and think they have it made, but clearly it doesn’t make them happy. In fact, given the number of divorces and trips to rehab, you could posit they are one of the least happy segments of the population. So stop being concerned with what other people think of you, it’s a waste of your energy and keeps you from having a quiet mind.

August 10, 2014 by Sara Weston

Be A Beginner

Beginners-Mind2

When you have the state of mind of a beginner, you allow yourself to try new things and are open to new ideas, which is energizing and fun. When you are a beginner, you’re not afraid to try something just because you won’t be good at it or because it’s “not you.” You can have a great time at something and do it without the intent of becoming an expert. Who doesn’t love and admire the eighty-one-year-old woman who is picking up the piano for the first time or the fifty-year-old who is just learning to surf, both of whom are unlikely to become experts in these fields.

When you have the mind state of an expert and are heavy with success, you’re more likely to stay in your comfort zone and limit your experiences to those in which you can excel, and obviously that is not a fun way to live. And even in the fields in which you are truly an expert, it’s always great to not know it all. In being open we create room to learn new things and refine and improve our knowledge and skills.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, life is simply harder when you approach it as a know-it-all. When we think back on times when we “knew it all,” we invariably created more work for ourselves. I recall a time at one of my first jobs, the sous-chef saw me laboriously chopping an onion and said, “Hey, let me show you a great way to quickly dice an onion.” I replied, “I already know how” and summarily cut off the opportunity to learn how to do something in a more efficient way. At some point, I did learn the professional way to dice an onion and was amazed at what an idiot I had been. In “knowing it all,” I looked like an idiot to my coworkers by clinging to an inefficient way, but more importantly, I kept myself from learning a much better way of doing something. I’m grateful I had this experience so I could learn firsthand the beauty of being a beginner!

(Slightly amusing aside: after the book was published with this entry, several people asked me how to cut an onion.)

July 22, 2014 by Sara Weston

Buy the Lottery Ticket

orange candy-pola Do you know the lottery ticket story? I like the version Elizabeth Gilbert tells in Eat, Pray, Love:

“There’s a wonderful old Italian joke about a poor man who goes to church every day and prays before the statue of a great saint, begging, ‘Dear saint—please, please, please…give me the grace to win the lottery.’ This lament goes on for months. Finally the exasperated statue comes to life, looks down at a begging man and says in weary disgust, ‘My son—please, please, please…buy a ticket.'”

Point being, ya gotta buy a ticket in order for the universe to help you win the lottery. Meaning you have to create structures that allow the energy of the universe to come through and help you. For instance, if you are looking for a job, you have to work on your resume and make it impeccable, then strategically distribute it and meet with agencies, contacts, etc. You have to lay the ground work which will allow the universe to provide you with the perfect job. No one is going to call you out of the blue and offer you a job if they don’t even know you exist! Similarly, if you are looking for a new place to live, the universe will provide the perfect place for your circumstances, but again you have to do the ground work—you have to look at the ads and go visit places. If you ask, the universe will definitely help you out, but you have to do your part to make it manifest.

Partial excerpt from the book How to Be Happy NOW…Even if Things Aren’t Going Your Way, available on Amazon, Amazon UK and Amazon DE. © 2013 – 2014 Sara Weston. A FREE excerpt of the book is available here.

July 8, 2014 by Sara Weston

Small Happiness Tip: Hassle the Details!

A tremendous amount of energy and trouble is saved when you pay your bills on time, get directions before you leave for a new location, review important documents/ statements in a timely manner, etc. It may not make you enlightened, but it will sure make your day-to-day life easier.

June 30, 2014 by Sara Weston

What You Focus On You Become

Tips-Illus-Movies2 (Fifth entry in an ongoing series in which movies are used to illustrate happiness concepts and tips.)

It is a spiritual principle that what you focus on, you become. The mind is like water and takes on the shape of whatever you put it in. So if you focus strongly on a school or work project, your mind will be filled with that project; if you surf the Internet constantly, you will feel very dull as that is the vibration of the Internet; if you focus on how you were a victim of some injustice, you will be filled with victimhood; if you play a lot of aggressive video games, you will feel really aggressive; if you watch a lot of pornography, you will become obsessed with sex; if you focus on enlightenment, your mind will be filled with light. There’s no judgement here, it’s just literally that what you put into your mind is what you will think about and as a result, who you become.

TOTAL-RECALL-ENDING This principle is illustrated in the movie Total Recall (1990). In the movie, Hauser (played by Arnold Schwarzenegger) is a secret agent who wants to infiltrate the rebel stronghold so he can assassinate their leader, Kuato, and snuff out the rebellion. Since Kuato is deeply psychic and could easily identify an infiltrator who wants to kill him, Hauser orchestrates a very elaborate series of events, including having his memories wiped, so he can infiltrate the rebels with a mind free of his traitorous intent. But what happens is that in his secret identity as Douglas Quaid, he falls in love with one of the rebels and sympathizes with their plight. Immersed in the rebels’ world he becomes one of them. And then when he sees a video of himself saying it was all a setup to kill Kuato and now it’s time to have his Hauser memories restored, he has no desire to go back to being Hauser (despite the big house and Mercedes). By being immersed in the rebel stronghold, he took on their states of mind, their perceptions and didn’t want to go back to his old mind (and didn’t).

Your mind, like Hauser’s, will take on the vibration of whatever you put it into, so take care where you put your mind! And always focus on the high and bright.*

*When I say to focus on the high and bright, this is not meant to imply that you should deny your problems or issues. In fact, in order to have a happy mind, you must address your problems and keep your personal, financial and career houses in order precisely so your mind can be free to focus on the high and bright. More on this topic can be found can be found in this post on how to be mindful.

May 30, 2014 by Sara Weston

Don’t waste time waiting for someone to save you.

Pink Flwrs You have probably heard the expression that life is what happens to you while you’re waiting for your ship to come in. If you’re looking for someone to sweep into your life and save you from your unhappiness, you are simply postponing your happiness. No one else can make you happy. Certainly there are people that are fun to be around, and there are people who have money that makes some things in life more comfortable, but expecting another person to be the source of your happiness keeps you from doing the work that will bring energy and happiness into your life right now. You’ll be happier if you quit waiting for that ship to come in and just take control of what you need to do to feel happy. Don’t take a back seat role in your own life!

How to Be Happy NOW

…even if things aren't going your way

mindfulness