How To Be Happy

In order to understand how to be happy, we need to look at how we think. there 

There are three different ways we react to everything around us.

The first is by wanting

Were brought up in a culture where we're told that we need to obtain something or reach a certain goal in order to be happy, we need to get that new phone, we need to get a bigger TV, we need to get that promotion, we need to take a picture of this meal and put it onto Instagram. but if you think back to any major purchase you made,or the achievement you reached, your picture you posted, sure you felt happier for a while but soon after you are back on the hunt every single time you end up finding yourself back at your original level of happiness only this time with less money in your wallet and more wrinkles on your face.so it's safe to say happiness doesn't lie in the wanting category.

The second way we react is by rejecting

From the moment we wake up our the mind automatically, starts to look for things to reject around us, I feel so tired but I have to go to work, it so cold I don't want to leave my bed we reject others oh he's so awkward, why can't this cashier do his job properly we reject ourselves so out of shape why am I such a loser again it's safe to say there isn't much happiness here either.

The third way we react is by zoning out

What was confronted with a task that's quote-unquote boring like commuting to work or waiting at the doctor's office we tend to zone out everything becomes a sort of hazy it's almost as if you put on a black and white filter over your yes your brain goes on to sleep mode, and your mind is either lost in the past over past regrets or lost in the future filled with anxiety about things that might go wrong .does not sound like a fun place to be these three ways of reacting makeup over ninety-nine percent of the way the average person goes about his day to day life, no wonder they're unhappy so how do I become happy ?well there's actually a fourth way of reacting.

Something that we only experience once in a blue moon is here where happiness really lies, it's the way you reacted when you visited the Grand Canyon for the first time, it's the feeling astronauts describe when they see the Earth from outer space, it's the way you were when you were younger, able to spend hours just looking at bugs and pictures, it's called mindfulness. 

Think of it as the opposite of zoning out your zoning is being hyper-aware of everything in front of you the way something feels the way it moves it smell all of its features and nothing else, this means there's no room for wanting, no room for rejecting and you certainly not zoned out.

all of your focus is just on the exact thing or event happening right in front of you, there is no judgment there's simply room for you to take it all in, and when you react to things and events with mindfulness, happiness follows and it stays for good. By simply learning how to focus on what's in front of you, you make room for happiness in your life and the only way to become more mindful in your reactions on a day-to-day basis is by practicing meditation.

Now I'm sure there's a lot of you thinking, oh god this is some hocus-pocus nonsense, I've heard about meditation, it makes no sense I'm not going to sit down and do nothing for 10-20 minutes, but there are literally hundreds of studies backing up this claim which will be the topic of our next article, the benefits of meditation and the scientific back it up.

so if you've been looking for the answer to the life-old question of how to be happy, look no further, stop looking for a shortcut because I can just about a hundred percent guarantee you the answer lies in mindfulness and meditation in the upcoming weeks we're going to dive deeper into these concepts.