http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yXEfjVnYkqM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPtuekvJdhs&feature=fvw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qmsh0kRKyB4

I got laughing so hard at all of these tonight my eyes are watering and my face aches with it…..ha ha ha!!!!!!!! I dare you to watch them all, back to back…...HA!!!!!!! The last one is priceless, and the participants in that “chain” good sports, all. 2 years ago

because it holds to key to Everything Good. I have this voice in my head that tells me to be unhappy, critical, I don’t get enough, blah, blah blah. It’s totally up to me whether I listen to that voice. I don’t know if that voice will lessen if I stop feeding it, or it will scream for even more attention.

I do know if I stay mindful of it, and deliberately place my attention on something else, with gratitude, I am happy. I listen to myself start to complain, and I can just Stop. I remember in the creative writing classes I have had, they say that interesting drama is from one bad thing after another happening. But Drama does not make a particularly good life, not for me. I can choose to suffer, or not. The ‘news’ that is on the TV, internet, etc. all seems to be about the Bad Things that Happen. Well, maybe it’s just human nature, but my mind will go there too.

But I can change the channel, or enter a different show at the Cineplex, by pulling myself back…to…me. The moment. The more I do this, the happier I am. I see myself start to get a negative emotion, and I now ask: “Why? Why is this so important to me?” I am starting to get to a point where I can laugh at myself for being so sensitive. I don’t have to base my happiness on anyone’s opinion, or outside success, and especially that voice in my mind that tries to find reasons not to be happy. That voice is not my friend, and I listen to it less and less, because I see how it lies to me. I don’t have to create false drama on things that are bad news. My life doesn’t have to be a reality show of anger, one-upmanship, and spite. I can be geniunly happy for those around me. I can be a real friend, not a smiling mask.

In pulling back to who I really want to be, I choose to be happy. Sure there’s the biochemical, and I take my supplements and rejoice in exercise these days. I seek for something more, though, which is the discipline to just let go: let go of the negative, no matter how many times it tries to come back. I can, in a way, be free of me. In that void, abiding by the laws of a metaphysical thermodynamics, something will come rushing in, something I believe is meant to be the real me. I like that person more and more, as I like and accept this world more and more. 2 years ago

FlyLady is big on the 15 minute rule, usually do something for 15 minutes. But today someone wrote in:

“I even use it to keep my mouth shut when something is obviously not my business. If I am involved in a controversy but something seems important enough to say after 15 minutes (of careful consideration), then I’ll say it. Otherwise, I can let it go. This has allowed me to release things and people I have no control over and no business trying to control—more time and peace of mind for me!”

That really hit home: and I am going to do it! I have been so much better at this goal, but I hadn’t thought to put a timer to it! 2 years ago

whine, or try to get my way. I don’t feel it’s spiritual, and it hurts me and the others around me. So I’ll work on this more =) 2 years ago

finding exquisite handmade masks at an art fair, and purchasing some for my wee beasties (nephews and nieces) and then wearing them around my apartment to amuse myself and to see how the kids would like wearing them. Are they comfortable…can you see well out the eye holes etc… why, yes! So far, the Spiderman one was the most comfortable, and I am currently wearing it as I type. (Perhaps I identify with it because I also have such ubersuperduper “Spidey Sense”.)

They are mucho coolio.
I so love being a kid…...er…oh…wait….what? I am HOW OLD??2 years ago

even when I know I’m right. Boy that happens a lot and it’s easier, and happier, to just go silent. I see all the fighting that goes on between people, and I just don’t want any part of it. 2 years ago

is simply reveling in the joy, energy and smoothness that is my healthy body.

Health is wealth, and I have riches. 2 years ago

that, for me, sometimes I have to just shut up. I got a psychic reading recently and it said not to be so obstinate. And it’s true, I can feel myself going into Obstinate Mode. It’s so weird, it’s almost like a rush. I started to do that today, and I came to a Full Stop and did something else instead.

I do have a different way of looking at things in life, and it would just cause problems if I tried to explain it. And sometimes it’s giving advice or boundary violations. And again, it’s just that rush. So it just makes me happier if I accept I’m different (I suspect it’s the pagan in me, I think differently) and just live and let live.

Letting go…and falling into Happification. 2 years ago

Got a wonderful postcard from a Kansas 43 T meetup signed by Todd, Foole, sicklittlemonkey, jesstheex, and Flirt! Thank you all so much, really made my month =), showed up when I needed a boost, and is now displayed proudly on my ‘fridge. Wish I coulda been there

Happification, indeed! 2 years ago

was one of the first days off I have had in a while where nothing else was on the agenda. What made me incredibly, blissfully happy was just wandering around town for a few hours in the morning, in and out of shops saying hello to the vendors who are back in town for the season, walking down by the shore and feeding bread to gulls, sitting on a bench in the park and watching people blow bubbles that made the air around me sparkle with their iridescence. It has been a while since I had nothing I had to do. It felt SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO good….... 3 years ago

finding Happification even in the middle of an on-going abusive situation is a growing experience for me. I have to consciously pull myself back from the emotions and look for something good. This helps me to center and find balance (another goal) a lot. 3 years ago

in the deep south, and it is so pretty, with the hot blue skies and now thunderstorms. It makes me so happy to be able to see the changes of the seasons, the turning of the Wheel.

I have such wonderful friends too, and I am off to see a couple this fine Saturday. Love is sustainable Happification in and of itself. 3 years ago

My teacher came up to me in clinicals and almost sent me home. Why? Of course, my clothes were ‘too wrinkled’. Now understand there is at least one gal whose clothes always look horrible and not a word is said to her. My clothes were freshly washed, hung up straight from the dryer, and pressed. My hair is neat, I shower every day, so just really really really WTF?????

I pointed out my shoes were bought the day before (after the shoe fiasco, I buy shoes about once a month, as I accept I am held to far higher standards than everyone else in the class, most of whom are still wearing dirty shoes they had since the beginning). No matter. So I was threatened once again with clinical probation for this (again, the only student). I am considering the expense of just taking my uniforms to the dry cleaners till the end of term, and saving the receipts for evidence. But for now I bought a ubernicer ironing board, and superduper starch. I do accept it will probably not be enough. I am getting learned helplessness.

Oh, I am also one of only two students who actually has the approved school jacket, everyone else wears these strange clothes. Again, no matter.

But I had a meltdown again, and just called in sick Friday. I was sick actually, and just slept in. But I know it’s stress. I suspect she’s perused my file, saw the previous write-up, and/or spoke to former teacher. I just cry that I always get my classroom teacher as my clinical teacher. The only student, ever. Why? It is a living hell. I don’t want to suffer, but enough. Everyone talks about how nice, once again, the other clinical teacher is. Why me, always?

I did a oral report last week, and I did all the work, basically. The woman I was assigned to didn’t do anything, not a bit. The report she handed in for me to put on the powerpoint, had all sorts of mistakes. It was horrible. But does she, who is in my clinial group, ever get blasted? ha, of course not. My powerpoint blew the others out of the water. The teacher said it was awesome, I should be a teacher myself the way I can explain things. But again, brains don’t count. Clothes, apparently, are everything.

So I am trying to see how not to suffer around this. I just don’t know. I am praying to get through this. I am seriously considering just dropping and take the final semester at another school, or at night, and plead/beg/whine my way into not having the same teacher for clinicals/class.

I am looking for an answer, as this time, I really feel I might lose my mind.

For now, I am just going to assume I have indeed already failed, and just start planning to act accordingly. I’m just going to show up and…whatever. I’m done. I don’t want to care anymore. 3 years ago

that really has me thinking. Here’s a quote:

“You see, I’d recently committed to a non-negotiable understanding with myself. I’d committed to “The End of Suffering.” I’d finally managed to exile the voices in my head that told me my personal happiness was only as good as my outward success, rooted in things that were often outside my control. I’d seen the insanity of that equation and decided to take responsibility for my own happiness. And I mean all of it.”

This was after her husband told her he didn’t love her, never did, and wanted out. Her way of dealing with it intrigues me. So I’m going to get the book, and start my End of Suffering. This will have an immediate challenge in my clinicals, where I am stuck with my classroom teacher (she will not let anyone switch groups) and she clearly does not like my work. On top of that, most of the other students in my clinical group are the Mean Girls, headed up by the one, A, who clearly cannot stand me and has been rude to me from day one. She won’t even acknowledge me when I try to talk to her. So I get the teacher that slams me in review, I didn’t get a nice cookie baking teacher, and most of the nicer gals are in the other group, and I can’t switch. So I have to deal. So the beginning is realizing they can’t define my happiness. I know I will eat my lunches alone, but it’s nice weather and I can go outside and soak up nature

So my goal is to be happy, not to let them define it, and to not let any of this go into the other areas of my life. Today I picked up the phone and called several friends, cheerfully sharing news.

To be continued…

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/02/fashion/02love.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1 3 years ago

Sometimes happification is just spending time in my own company doing whatever I want…..

I like being on Bee Time. :~D 3 years ago

More often than not, what this means for me is engaging in conscious acts or behavior that promote, or practicing and affirming thoughts that create and generate happiness within myself; not being dependent on another or others to grant it to me or allowing anyone to be overly influential to my state of mind or spirit at any given time. (Not saying this doesn’t ever happen, of course it does, I am human; we ALL lend and share parts of ourselves with others whom we love, and when I do that, I do so willingly and with an open heart, in the spirit of interdependence rather than dependence.) This weekend I purposefully sought out soul satisfying, fun things; I created, I took walks despite frigid temperatures, I engaged in conversations, I accepted a dinner invitation to a family gathering of some friends of mine, I cuddled and hugged people, I accepted a gracious offer to be tutored in something I have been wanting to learn for years, I entertained the proposal of a second job, from a trustworthy source….. I was much in need of many of those things this weekend, in need of happification. I am glad that I am still a “seeker”, that I still want and seek out happiness and contentment. I am not saying I strive to live in an unrealistic state of unalloyed bliss or that I never get “down”; that is hardly the case. I do live with a heart FULL of all kinds of feelings, and in IMHO they are all valid, even the painful, unpopular, less than pretty ones. And I am imperfect, or as I like to say, imperfectly perfect, at least with regard to being me. And all that makes me happy. Because that’s LIFE. I LIVE. It’s what I am here for. And I like to live in color. So when ever I can, I make the attempt to happify myself, by any means necessary!! LOL. It was a successful weekend with regard to happification, very soothing, calming, uplifting…...... 3 years ago

I had the good fortune to have a special “Happy Place” during the latter part of the summer. I loved being there, it filled me with joy, it happified me, and I think when I was there, I was so happy, I glowed from the inside. Alas, the place, for reasons I’d rather not go into, is no more. But I am still carrying it with me, and you know what, I think I always will. There was something magical about it, something that not only made me happy, but helped to heal parts of my spirit, and put me back in touch with my creative energy. Anyway, as things go, I needed to return the keys. But before I did, I went and made copies. Not because I ever plan on going there again, I am no trespasser. Aside from which it is, in effect, no more. No, I got spares made to dangle on a silk cord, black silk, around my neck, close to my heart. I got two made, one in a leopard print, and the other in gold. It makes a rather cool looking necklace if I do say so myself. I am wearing it as I type. It is a symbolic representation of a very meaningful, magical, creative and sweet period of time for me. The metaphorical, symbolic “keys to happiness”, and I have them around my neck. I recognize more and more these days the fact that true happiness lies within, and IS a choice, and thus this goal, to actively practice random acts of happification, and today, these keys and having them made, and now wearing them, makes me very happy. 3 years ago

I know, usually, what makes me happy, content, blissful, grateful…etc. This isn’t a goal about being a Pollyanna; it’s a goal about engaging in the mindful practice of things that make me feel any of the above, and inspiring and encouraging that in others, to the best of my ability and to the extent that they’ll let me.

I put it into practice today, for myself, after an incident happened that left me feeling unhappy and with hurt feelings. I did a few things, put my objective into practice, to help lift myself out of it. First I swore like a pirate, but it was OK, because I was in the bathtub and therefor able to wash my own mouth out with soap. LOL!! Then I went and ordered a soulful, happifying book via interlibrary loan; the library is always a “happifying” place for me. Then, I went to the grocery store and got one of my favorite snacks, hummus and bagel crisps….....mmmmmmmmm…........munch, munch….....and I also bought myself some FLOWERS…...in bright, autumnal colors. Put them in a vase, and yelled out another “FUCK YOU!!” in the general direction of the perpetrator. I feel better already.

Happification in practice. 3 years ago