Choose to take care of your body – Taking care of your body is crucial to being the happiest person you can be. If you don’t have your physical energy in good shape, then your mental energy (your focus), your emotional energy (your feelings), and your spiritual energy (your purpose) will all be negatively affected. Recent studies conducted on people who were clinically depressed showed that consistent exercise significantly raises happiness levels in the near-term. Not only that, six months later, the people who had continued to exercise were less likely to relapse into depression because they had a higher sense of self-accomplishment and self-worth.
Choose honesty – Start being honest with yourself and everyone else. Don’t cheat. Be faithful. Be kind. Do the right thing! It is a less complicated way to live. Integrity is the essence of everything successful. When you break the rules of integrity you invite serious complications into your life. Keep life simple and enjoyable by doing what you know in your heart is right. Don’t get involved with drama that doesn’t affect you.
Choose to help others when you’re able – Care about people. In life, you get what you put in. When you make a positive impact in someone else’s life, you also make a positive impact in your own life. Do something that’s greater than you – something that helps someone else to be happy or to suffer less.
Choose to let go when you know you should – Sometimes you have to be strong for yourself. Love is worth fighting for, but you can’t be the only one fighting. People need to fight for you too. If they don’t, you eventually have to move on and realize that what you gave them was more than they were willing to give you. Some relationships and situations just can’t be fixed. If you try to force them back together, things will only get worse. Holding on is being brave, but letting go and moving on is often what makes us stronger and happier.
Choose to embrace the next step in your life – You can hold on to the past, or you can create your own happiness today. Never let success get to your head and never let failure get to your heart. Every day is a new beginning and a new ending. Embrace it, make the best of it, smile, and keep looking straight ahead. And don’t forget, a smile doesn’t always mean a person is happy right now; sometimes it simply means they are strong enough to face their problems going forward.
Author: Marc Chernoff