Quotes about Happiness

We have somehow gotten the idea that the abundant life Jesus promised in John 10:10 means an abundance of health, wealth, and happiness. The idea of suffering for the sake of Christ is foreign to us. We have substituted the pursuit of happiness for the pursuit of holiness. We hesitate to sacrifice even our material possessions for His cause, let alone sacrificing our lives or the lives of our children upon the altar of His service.

T]oday some people continue to view themselves as victims because of the historical suffering of their group and because it is easy and comforting to do so. And this renders happiness virtually impossible. First…perceiving yourself as a victim makes you unhappy. Second, it makes you permanently angry, which further guarantees unhappiness. Third, it enables you to avoid confronting whatever it is that is really making you unhappy.

When spring came, even the false spring, there were no problems except where to be happiest. The only thing that could spoil a day was people and if you could keep from making engagements, each day had no limits. People were always the limiters of happiness except for the very few that were as good as spring itself.

Out of all the things you could not have there were some things that you could have and one of those was to know when you were happy and to enjoy all of it while it was there and it was good.

It was like certain dinners I remember from the war. There was much wine, an ignored tension, and a feeling of things coming that you could not prevent happening. Under the wine I lost the disgusted feeling and was happy. It seemed they were all such nice people.

Happiness is often presented as being very dull but, he thought, lying awake, that is because dull people are sometimes very happy and intelligent people can and do go around making themselves and everyone else miserable. He had never found happiness dull. It always seemed more exciting than any other thing and capable of as great intensity as sorrow to those people who were capable of having it.

that every day should be a fiesta seemed to me a marvelous discovery

It's funny,' I said. 'It's very funny. And it's a lot of fun, too, to be in love.' 'Do you think so?' her eyes looked flat again. 'I don't mean fun in that way. In a way it's an enjoyable feeling.' 'No,' she said. 'I think it's hell on earth.

So now do not worry, take what you have, and do your work and you will have a long life and a very merry one.

The only thing that could spoil a day was people and if you could keep from making engagements, each day had no limits. People were always the limiters of happiness except for the very few that were as good as spring itself.

He was fairly happy, except that, like many people living in Europe, he would rather have been in America, and he had discovered writing.

When you have two people who love each other, are happy and gay and really good work is being done by one or both of them, people are drawn to them as surely as migrating birds are drawn at night to a powerful beacon.