The Recipe for Happiness

Why do we do what we do? We are more or less trying to put the pieces together to create moments of importance that will make us happy. We might not realize it but what we do decides happiness. Happiness is in the food we eat, the dollars we earn, the sweat we drip to burn some calories, the jokes we crack, the moment we spend with our loved ones; the bottom line is we control our happiness. When Einstein said- “A table, a chair, a bowl of fruit and a violin; what else does a man need to be happy”, he must have meant that happiness is in the minor things that we often oversee.

Earn a billion dollars but you could still have done better, get straight A’s in all courses yet you could have ignored some mistakes in your papers, be super famous still you can’t have the whole world following you; whatever you do however big that may be, it looks small when compared to something bigger. So, how can a person be happy knowing there is something more that he could have done or somebody else has achieved greater heights? The simple answer is satisfaction, the principle ingredient for happiness.

Being the richest guy in town, the best student in the university or the highest paid manager might ensure success in profession but not necessarily in life. A person successful in life possesses inner tranquility, peace of mind and extreme satisfaction for whatever he has achieved no matter how trivial. What gives human beings deep satisfaction is the minor things we tend to ignore. Laughing, making others smile, helping the helpless, chilling, enjoying moments of peace, spreading love, doing things one likes, taking things lightly, believing and being oneself can actually give us happiness.

But, doing things we enjoy the most always, can mislead us in the long run. Real happiness is long term and it is very important to assess all our major decisions in every step of our life. Doing that, we may need to sacrifice our happiness momentarily to ensure sustained happiness in future. A drug addict or an alcoholic would surely gain peaks of happiness when he is on a high, but the implications of his activities will compel him to live an unhealthy and depressed life in future.

In sum, happiness is a cup of light heartedness, some wholesome effort in the field of interest and a spoon of satisfaction blended together with a grain of control to avoid overdoing things that can have harmful effects in future.