Joy

"We find greatest joy, not in getting, but in expressing what we are...Men do not really live for honors or for pay; their gladness is not the taking and holding, but in doing, the striving, the building, the living. It is a higher joy to teach than to be taught. It is good to get justice, but better to do it; fun to have things but more to make them. The happy man is he who lives the life of love, not for the honors it may bring, but for the life itself."
R. J. Baughan

We are always talking about how happy we will be when we get..." That is bad, first of all because we are telling ourselves that we can only be happy at some time in the future, never today. But it also misses the point. Happiness is not about what we get. It is about who we are and what we do. If you stop to make a list about what really makes you happy in life, you will realize that most of those things are not material acquisitions, or even ones like the love of another person.

Because most of us only know conditional love, we need the love of another person as a way to validate our own self-worth. Almost all of us judge our worth by how much other people like us. The love of another person does not make us happy as much as it brings us relief. When it comes down to it, it is the act of loving another person that makes us feel happy and worthwhile, not having that other person love us. We only really appreciate this when we perform an altruistic act. Then we know that it's true.

It is the acts of loving, giving, and creating that make us truly happy. We were born to be the givers, not the receivers. We were born to be active, not passive. We were born to grow, to live our lives with enjoyment and enthusiasm. This is what makes us happy.

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