Tomorrow’s Happiness Begins Today

What does happiness mean to you? There's a lot of searching going on these days for the elusive emotion of being happy –where do you find it, how do you create it, even what it actually is. But I like to share a little secret with you — happiness is not just for a lucky few who were born with it. You see, happiness is not something you can reach out and touch or put in the refrigerator and take a sip when you need it. Happiness is not found on a beach in Hawaii (really!) or in a perfect body. It's not even in that perfect relationship that Tom Cruise tries to sell us in the movies. Yet from the images bombarding you every day, it's easy to make the mistake that happiness will arrive on your doorstep when you have the latest car, the best clothes, a fancy home, isn't it? It's easy to get caught in the trap of thinking that if you could just find the right person, they'd arrive with a box of happiness attached to his/her hip. But all this convince you that happiness is something to be found outside of yourself. And that's where you get off track. Because the secret is that happiness is simply a by-product of creating and living a life that works, a life that you enjoy — whatever that is.

If you want to be happy tomorrow you need to begin working at it today. Some people spend their lives waiting for happiness to arrive on its own and it never comes. Others work hard at creating wealth but still aren't happy, discovering that money only brings a whole different set of problems. Happiness is a state of mind and not the size of your bank account.

Happiness is emotional and not physical. Each individual needs to work at creating their own happiness. I like how Richard Bach, the author of Jonathan Livingston Seagull, put it when he said, If your happiness depends on what somebody else does, I guess you do have a problem. To find happiness you first have to understand where happiness comes from.

Memories are to the mind what a mirror is to the eyes – a reflection. The mirror reflects the physical while our memories reflect the emotional. When you look in the mirror it reflects what you look like; when you look in your mind it reflects who you are. One big difference between the two is that you can change what you see in the mirror but you can't change the memories reflected in your mind. We tend to spend a lot of time trying to improve what we see in the mirror, but little or no effort trying to improve our thoughts. Every action creates a memory. Do you really think that the person who is bitter and angry today was happy and cheerful yesterday? If a person says or does something which angers or upsets us, we can either add to the painful memory with our own negative actions or we can replace them with positive actions and create positive memories. If you want to be happy tomorrow you must choose carefully what you do today, because today's actions will be reflected in tomorrow's memories and you can not make them go away. Everything you do today will be in tomorrow's reflection. The next time a person angers you, instead of lashing out, try imagining that you are holding up a mirror that bounces the reflection back at him, knowing that his actions or words are a reflection of him and not of you. We all want to like what we see in the mirror. To be truly happy we also have to like what we see reflected in our minds. What the mirror reflects is not nearly as powerful as what the mind reflects, for it reflects our words and actions. What will your reflections be filled with? Will your reflections/memories be filled with goodness and joy or with bitterness and anger? What have you done today that will bring you happiness tomorrow?