The How of Happy: Pleasure & Happiness

Lots of folks mistake pleasure for happiness. The fact is, they are not the same. Pleasure is a sensual experience; happiness is a psychological experience. Pleasure is found in the body's interaction with external stimuli. Happiness is an internal state.

Just piling up the pleasures will not bring about happiness. And you can be extremely happy even when your life is not pleasurable. The two do not correlate in any meaningful way.

By pointing out the difference between happiness and pleasure, though, I am in no way denigrating pleasure. By all means, enjoy pleasure when you can. William Blake may well be right when he tells us that "the road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom." Just remember, when pleasure is unavailable, that is no reason to be unhappy.

Pleasure. Happiness. Both have their place. Viva la difference!

Happiness Is You!

Everybody wants to be happy. Not have happy or do happy, but BE happy!

Happiness has very little to do with having. It is not even based upon doing. Happiness is deeply rooted in your Being; it is a core attribute of who you really are.

I teach people how to be happy. As Hermann Hesse said, "Happiness is a how, not a what; a talent, not an object."

Through keynote speeches and workshops, counseling and coaching, blogs and books, I help people live happier lives. To find out more, email me at thehowofhappy@gmail.com

May all beings be happy!

Various Views on Happiness

"A happy person is not a person in a certain set of circumstances, but rather a person with a certain set of attitudes."

-- Hugh Downs

"The secret of happiness lies in the taking of genuine interest in all the details of daily life."

-- William Morris

"Man is unhappy because he does not know he is happy. It is only that. That's all, that is all! If one finds out one will become happy, at once, that minute."

-- Dostoevsky

"There is no way to happiness, happiness is the way."

-- Thich Nhat Hanh

"As soon as we wish to be happier, we are no longer happy."

-- Walter Landor

"But I don't think of the future or the past, I feast on the moment. This is the secret of happiness, but only reached now in middle age."

-- Virginia Woolf

"We all want to be happy and we're all going to die --the only two unchangeable true facts that apply to every human being on the planet. "

-- William Boyd

"Happiness is a state of mind not a goal."

-- Stephen M. Pollan

"No matter what you are doing keep the undercurrent of happiness. Learn to be secretly happy in your heart in spite of all circumstances."

-- Yogananda

"We choose our happiness incrementally, hour by hour, moment by moment, now."

-- Alexandra Stoddard

"Seek happiness in the present and you'll find it in the future."

-- Kazuo Suzuki

"By being happy we sow anonymous benefits upon the world."

-- Robert Louis Stevenson

"Human happiness and human satisfaction must ultimately come from within oneself."

-- Dalai Lama

"The foolish man seeks happiness in the distance; the wise grows it under his feet."

-- James Oppenheim

"Man cannot be happy and strong until he, too, lives with nature in the present, above time."

-- Emerson

"In about the same degree that you are helpful you will be happy."

-- Teodore Reik

"In the end it turn out that we're all taking different paths in pursuit of the same goal -- happiness."

-- Kristi Royse

"Happiness depends more in the inner disposition of the mind than on outward circumstances."

"You'll never be happy if you continue to search for what happiness consists of. You will never live if you are looking for the meaning of life."

-- Ben Franklin

"I believe that four ingredients are necessary for happiness: health, warm personal relations, sufficient means to keep you from want, and successful work."

-- Bertrand Russell

"Cultivating the vital energy of mindfulness will keep us focused on happiness."

-- Alexandra Stoddard

"Happiness is a continuation of happenings which are not resisted."

-- Deepak Chopra

"The only ones among you who will be really happy are those who will have sought and found how to serve."

-- Albert Schweitzer

"The man who is born with a talent that he is meant to use finds his greatest happiness using it."

-- Goethe

"Most people are about as happy as they make up their mind to be."

-- Abe Lincoln

"The simple truth is that nothing external will make you happy."

-- Stephen M. Pollan

"The search for happiness is one of the chief sources of unhappiness."

-- Eric Hoffer

"I have come to realize that when we are happy, we are in touch with our greatest human potential."

-- Alexandra Stoddard

"Be true to yourself, and you'll find just where you're supposed to be .. and you'll be happy."

-- Stephen M. Pollan

"I am famous now. But now that I've got fame and some of the other things I thought would make me happy -- it ain't worked."

-- Russell Brand

"Happiness may well consist primarily of an attitude towards time."

-- Robert Grudin

The How of Happy

Pleasure & Happiness

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