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Posts tagged with “happy”

Free to Shine: How I’m Rediscovering My Inner Light

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“When a flower doesn’t bloom, you fix the environment it grows in, not the flower.” ~Alexander Den Heijer

I remember the girl I used to be. Light, full of life, and constantly in motion—like a little twirl of joy spinning through the house. There was this rhythm inside me, an effortless dance between curiosity and wonder. I’d tap dance through the kitchen, counting how many twirls I could do before I lost my balance.

The world felt vast, endless, and open. I didn’t just see beauty in big, grand things. I found it in small moments and delicate objects, like …

How Gratitude and Mindfulness Gave Me My Life Back

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“Train your mind and heart to see the good in everything. There is always something to be grateful for.” ~Unknown

I used to rush through life, constantly ticking off to-dos, feeling like I was always chasing something just beyond my reach. My days were a blur of deadlines, errands, and commitments. And yet, in the quiet moments—when I finally lay my head on the pillow at night—there was this heaviness, this emptiness I couldn’t shake.

I kept telling myself that once I finished the next big project, once I achieved the next goal, I’d feel better. But that “better” feeling …

Too Busy Trying to Survive

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The Importance of Setting Strong, Healthy Boundaries

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“If you love yourself, it doesn’t matter if other people don’t like you because you don’t need their approval to feel good about yourself.” ~Lori Deschene

I spent my whole life trying to please other people. I would put myself through stress and discomfort to fit in with what they wanted or needed. I would rarely feel confident enough to communicate what I wanted because when I did, I would be met with frustration or anger, and I’d often come away feeling stupid.

When I was growing up, I would feel my emotions very strongly, so a lot of …

Maybe the Happy Ending Is…

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In the Middle of Our Happy Moments

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If You Haven’t Found Your Purpose: How to Feel Good Anyway

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“The person who lives life fully, glowing with life’s energy, is the person who lives a successful life.” ~Daisaku Ikeda

We’ve all heard the phrase “find your life purpose.” It gets thrown around so much nowadays. Many of us have been in what feels like an eternal quest to find it, especially if we’ve been feeling stuck, lost, and out of alignment. Finding our purpose then becomes an almost obsessive search for the solution that will solve all our problems.

We’ve been led to believe that a life purpose is a single thing, a calling that we’ll be passionate about…

How I Found the Good Within the Difficult

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“Inner strengths are the supplies you’ve got in your pack as you make your way down the twisting and often hard road of life.” ~Rick Hanson

“I had a rough day. Can we talk?” I asked my husband in 2015 after coming home from work. He nodded, and we sat down on the couch.

I continued: “I got really challenging performance feedback from my manager today. It was hard to hear because I know it’s true.”

It was the most significant critical feedback I had received at once. All afternoon, I’d ruminated on the conversation. I had sat in the …

Finding Happiness When Your Big Dreams Didn’t Come True

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“Everyone who gives up a serious childhood dream—of becoming an artist, a doctor, an engineer, an athlete—lives the rest of their life with a sense of loss, with nagging what-ifs.” ~Glenn Kurtz

Childhood dreams are a funny thing, aren’t they?

Our adolescent years are filled with nearly unlimited imagination of what we can achieve growing up. Some people become doctors, presidents, and professional athletes, so why can’t we? It just depends on hard work and occasional lucky breaks to get where you want.

Reality slowly starts to set in as you grow into your teenage and adult years. Maybe those …

The Strange Things That Make Your Weird Little Heart Happy

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3 Simple Steps to Create More Joy in Your Life

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“Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes.” ~Carl Jung

“Should I move back?” was the question I asked myself. It was 2018, and I had moved to Berlin eight months prior. And everything had gone wrong. So wrong.

I moved here for a relationship, but that relationship ended. I also moved for different work but found myself in a toxic environment. I had very little support from the community after my relationship ended. And I found myself horribly ill and in a hospital.

The easy thing to do would have been to move back to London. It was still

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Try This Fun Little Phrase to Immediately Boost Your Joy

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“Joy is the simplest form of gratitude.” ~Karl Barth

I had no way of knowing when I went to visit my brother’s family that summer in 2019 that my three-year-old niece would say seven words that would forever change my relationship with joy.

It was July and predictably steamy in Georgia where his family lives. I was visiting to meet my newborn nephew, and the stifling heat kept us all inside for most of my stay.

The second morning after I arrived, I was spending time with my younger niece and keeping her entertained. My older niece was at a …

5 Simple Ways to Make JOY Your Job This Year

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“Don’t wait for joy to find you, because you might end up waiting forever.” ~Unknown

Eight years ago, my husband and I made a pact to make joy our job.

We were in the middle of chasing little kids and careers, had a whole lot of stress (on the edge of burnout), and realized that something needed to change.

The idea started small, with the premise that if we waited for joy to find us, we might wait forever. We figured that life was going to require us to do something different to see a different result. It took us …

The World Would Be a Happier, More Peaceful Place

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If You Aren’t Happy with Yourself and Your Life Right Now…

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“For the person that needs to see this today: Your heart will heal, your tears will dry, your season will change. Rest tonight knowing the storm will end.” ~Unknown

When I was fifteen, I officially started engaging in the diet scene. As a teenager who was trying to fit in, feel pretty, and gain acceptance, I thought that food was the fix. Food—or the lack of it—would be the solution to all my problems. All that thought really did was make everything worse.

As a child, I would visit Europe every other year, to visit family. The culture and the …

How Highly Sensitive People Can Feel More Fulfilled in Their Relationships

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“Truth can be stated in a thousand different ways, yet each one can be true.” ~Swami Vivekananda

Highly sensitive people naturally bring some really beautiful, love-promoting qualities to their romantic partnerships. But these same qualities can sometimes end up undermining the strength of their relationships. This was true for me in my first marriage and led, in part, to it ending in divorce.

We HSPs are known for our caring, conscientious, and considerate natures. It matters deeply to us that we do our best to be loyal and caring in our relationships.

And because we tend to have high …

19 Things to Start Doing for Yourself in the New Year

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“And suddenly you know… it’s time to start something new and trust the magic of new beginnings.” ~Meister Eckhart

Did you know that 80% of New Year’s resolutions fail?

That’s pretty crazy. Maybe you’re part of that statistic. Feeling eager, excited, and ready for change only to fall back into old patterns after a few weeks.

This was me, year after year—striving for change but not managing to pull it through, but not last year.

A few days ago I found a letter I had written to myself on New Year’s Eve in 2016, describing how I wanted 2017 to …

Why True Happiness Is Not Just About Reaching Your Goals

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“Success isn’t about how your life looks to others. It’s about how it feels to you.” ~Michelle Obama

Do you have goals? Why do you have these goals? What will change if you accomplish them?

Will you be happy?

Think about this for a second: You’ve already achieved goals that you said would make you happy.

Pause.

Think about that again.

You’ve already achieved goals that you said would make you happy.

Well, that’s a humbling reality check, isn’t it? So why aren’t you experiencing everlasting happiness and satisfaction?

No matter the goal’s size, the reward level, or the …

How I Created My Own Roadmap for Happiness When I Was Feeling Lost in Life

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“Doing what you like is freedom, liking what you do is happiness.” ~Frank Tyger

Life is a web of uncertainty, where we often believe we are on the right path, only to realize we’ve been wandering down the wrong road all along. Ever been there? Thinking you have your whole life planned out? Deciding to go after the things that you think will make you happy, only to end up disappointed on the other side? If so, I completely understand how you feel.

There’s no definitive map leading to a happy or fulfilled life. There is no right or wrong …

If You Want to Be Happy

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